Evaluation of barriers to medication adherence among adult patients at medication adherence therapy clinic (MTAC) asthma in Hospital Selayang / Mohamed Nur Azri Che Mohamed Safri

Medication non-adherence is a serious problem in healthcare sector and patient population. Lack of adherence is due to the barriers of medication adherence which are patient and medication-related factors. Asthma is one of the health problems which has high rate of non-adherence. This study is to make an account of barriers and to identify the most common barriers which lead to lack of medication adherence among adult patients in Medication Therapy Adherence Clinic (MTAC) of Asthma at Hospital Selayang. This study was conducted using validated structured self-administered 30-items questionnaire. Forty five adult participants aged above 21 years old from MTAC of Asthma at Hospital Selayang were invited to participate in the study. Data analysis was carried out using SPSS version 17.0. Majority of participants were female (51.1%). Majority of participants (55.6%) had good adherence towards their medication. There was significance different between level of adherence and complexity of regimen (P value < 0.05). The results showed
that twenty one participants (46.7%) showed poor level of adherence due to high complexity of the regimen. Meanwhile, twelve participants (26.6%) experienced side effects which lead to lack of adherence. Only nine participants (20%) experienced fewer side effects but the level of adherence was poor. The other barriers such as general knowledge, patient-prescriber trust, cognitive functions, and social supports contributed to good level of adherence. Thus, all of these barriers to medication adherence must be overcome in order to increase the level of adherence.