Factors associated with compliance to antihypertensive therapy in patients visiting Tertiary Care Hospital.

Abstract

Objectives: The objective of this study is to factors associated with compliance to antihypertensive therapy in patients visiting tertiary care hospital. Study Design: Cross-Sectional study. Setting: (Dow Institute of Cardiology) Cardiology Department, Dow OJHA Campus and Karachi Institute of Heart Diseases (KIHD), Karachi. Period: July, 2019 to Dec, 2019. Material & Method: Over a period of 6 months participants were evaluated for their compliance to therapy. Data was collected using a questionnaire which consisted of sociodemographic profile, type of treatment regimen, compliance to medication and lifestyle changes. Compliance of all participants was calculated and factors associated with low compliance were pointed out. Data was analyzed using SPSS version 20. Results: A total of 271 patients visiting the hospital’s outpatient department matched the inclusion criteria of this study. Among them there were 69.3% (n=188) were males and 30.6% (n=83) females. Around 83% patients were married, while the rest were unmarried or divorced. Patients in our study had age range of 38-84 years with mean age of 49.5 + 11.7 years. Approximately 52.7% (n=143) patients were addicted to smoking, 15.4% (n=42) patients were addicted to alcohol. Our study showed that 47.6% (n=129) hypertensive patients were highly compliant to treatment, whereas 20.6% (n=56) were moderately compliant and 31.7% (n=86) patients were not compliant to the treatment. Only 39.4% of the patients were carrying out lifestyle modifications along with antihypertensive treatment. Conclusion: Compliance to antihypertensive therapy is of prime importance to decrease morbidity and mortality as complication to hypertension. Factors associated with non-compliance to antihypertensive therapy should be studied and possible interventions should be taken to increase adherence.