Assessment of Adherence of COPD Patients to Respiratory Drug Therapy in a Tertiary Care Hospital in Mangalore

Background: COPD is currently the fifth-leading cause of global mortality and a major public health problem in both developed and developing countries. By the year 2020, COPD is expected to become the third-most-common cause of death in the world and the fifth-leading cause of disease burden. As with all chronic diseases, non-adherence in patients with COPD is common and contributes to adverse health outcomes, reduced quality of life and increased healthcare expenditures. The evidence base for adherence to therapy in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients is very thin. The limited data available suggest that, as in other chronic diseases, adherence is often poor, and this has a negative influence on outcomes. Objectives: To measure the adherence level of COPD patients to respiratory drug therapy. To find out the association of adherence of COPD patients with selected demographic variables. Method: The study design was descriptive survey design. The purposive sampling technique was used to draw 50 patients as samples. Data was collected by administering the medication adherence rating scale to assess the adherence. Results: The result shows that majority 40 (80%) of patients are non adherent to the respiratory drug therapy and only 10 (20%) of patients are adherent to the drug therapy. there is no association between the adherence to respiratory therapy and the selected demographic variables like age, sex, education, diagnosed to have COPD since, habits and significant association between the occupation (χ²=18.889,p<0.05) and the adherence level of COPD patients to respiratory drug therapy.

Interpretation and conclusion: The findings of the study showed that majority of patients are non adherent to respiratory drug therapy.