Pharmaceutical Care Intervention Improves Adherence to Antiepileptic Medication

Purpose: Adherence to the chronic pharmacotherapeutic regimen is poor resulting in negative therapeutic outcomes. Health education has been shown to improve the adherence of patients to their antiepileptic medication. The Pharmacist has the responsibility of providing patient education and counselling in the context of pharmaceutical care. The study aims to evaluate the efficacy of pharmaceutical care intervention on patients’ adherence to prescribed self-administered antiepileptic medications.

Method: An opened, randomised, controlled, longitudinal and two-arm parallel prospective study with a 6-month patient follow up period was carried out on patients with epilepsy recruited from the medical and neurology out-patient clinics of two tertiary hospitals. Patients in the intervention group were provided with pharmaceutical care services. The impact of the pharmaceutical care intervention was evaluated by using the eight-Item Morisky Medication Adherence Scale. Repeated measure ANOVA was used to test the difference in the mean adherence score of the control and intervention groups over the time of intervention. The Pillai’s Trace F was the corrected statistical test of choice for the model estimate, while the estimated effect was assessed with Partial etha.

Results: There was a statistically significant difference in medication adherence scores between the control and intervention group over time with F (2, 154) = 62.621, p= 0.000, partial η2 = 0.45, as the mean medication adherence score of the intervention group increased from 3.70 (±1.60) at baseline to 4.04 (±1.42) and 6.89 (±0.77) at 3 months and 6 months respectively, indicating a substantial increase in medication adherence among patients in the intervention group compared with the control group where mean medication adherence scores were 3.86 (±1.69), 4.02 (±1.37) and 4.84 (±0.92) at baseline, 3 months and 6 months respectively.

Conclusion: Pharmaceutical care services implemented by a clinical pharmacist significantly improved the adherence to antiepileptic drugs in patients with epilepsy.