P-1257 - Influence of socio-demographic factors on therapeutic compliance in schizophrenia

Abstract

Introduction: One of the reasons of therapeutic failure in schizophrenia is the poor compliance.Many factors can interfere with the therapeutic adherence. We propose to study the therapeutic compliance in schizophrenia and to determinate the socio-demographic factors that could be associated with the therapeutic adherence. Objective: We studied the relationship between socio-demographic factors and therapeutic compliance in schizophrenia. Methods: It was a cross-sectional study conducted among 95 outpatients with schizophrenia during the months of January and February 2009 in the department of psychiatry D. Results: 54% of patients were observant. The average age of our sample was 41.2 years. We found a slight male predominance with 52.6% of men. Men were more frequently observant than women (58.0% vs 33.3%). The majority of our patients were not married: 82.1%. 96.8% of patients had electricity. 22.1% had heating. 6.3% had air conditioning and 35.8% had hot water. Almost half (42.1%) of patients had a level of primary education. The third had reached high school (32.6%) and 12.6% were illiterate. 5.3% had effectuated a professional training and only 7.4% had studied in a university. Three-quarters of surveyed patients were unemployed (75.8%). Discussion and conclusion: Some socio-demographic factors such as sex and employment status are correlated to the therapeutic compliance. While others are not: age, education, marital status and socioeconomic status. However, other factors should be considered and studied such as clinical features, treatment-related factors and those related to the environment of the patient to better identify and understand the treatment compliance.

Studying medication adherence in patients with schizophrenia

“…In contrast, Insel et al [33] stated that older patients may fail to adhere to treatments because of cognitive deficits, impairment in memory, and executive performance; furthermore, they are often prescribed multiple treatments. Many researches [12,30,31], including ours, found that marital status was not a risk factor for nonadherence. However, a study by Stanković et al [29] found significant difference between compliant and noncompliant patients regarding marital status.…”

“…In contrast, other investigators [12,30,31] found that education is not correlated to the therapeutic compliance. This may be attributed to the fact that better education could mean better access to illness-related information as the educational status may be correlated to the ability to understand and comprehend the psychological education given by the treating team.…”