Evaluation of Medication Adherence and its Related Factors among Type 2 Diabetic Patients

Diabetes is the most common chronic metabolic disease in the world and one of its control principles is the patient's adherence to the physician's treatment recommendations. This study aimed to determine the adherence to medication treatment and related factors in type 2 diabetic patients referring to the Diabetes Clinic of Shahid Beheshti Hospital, Hamadan, Iran, in 2020.

The present cross-sectional study was conducted on 284 patients with type 2 diabetes referring to the Diabetes Clinic of Shahid Beheshti Hospital. The data collection tool was a researcher-made questionnaire whose validity and reliability were confirmed in a pilot study. Data were analyzed in Stata software (version 11) at the significance level of 0.05.

Most of the patients were women (64.08%) and urban dwellers (79.08%). The mean age of the patients was obtained at 54.78 years, and 47.89% of the patients had poor medication adherence. Patients' medication adherence showed a statistically significant relationship with gender, marital status, education, physician's respectful behavior, respect for patient privacy, physician skill, the satisfaction of the physician, a history of other diseases, and a history of hypertension (P<0.05).

It was revealed the medication adherence rate was not satisfactory in patients with type2 diabetes. In this study, the identified causes associated with poor medication adherence included factors related to the patient, care team and health system, treatment, and disease status.