Abstract
Context:: Medication nonadherence is a significant barrier in achieving seizure freedom in patients with epilepsy. There is a deficiency of data about the reasons for nonadherence in Saudi population. Aims:: The aim of this study is to prove the existence of nonadherence to antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) in patients with epilepsy and identify the responsible factors. Setting and Design:: This is a prospective, cross-sectional study carried in the Department of Neurology at King Fahd Hospital of the University affiliated with Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University. Subjects and Methods:: Patients of all ages diagnosed to have epilepsy as mentioned in their medical record and taking antiepileptic medications were interviewed using a questionnaire. Statistical Analysis Used:: Statistical analysis was performed using IBM Statistical Package for the Social Sciences version 21 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA). Statistical significance was defined as two-tailed with a P 0.05. Results:: Among 152 participants, 52.6% were male and 47.4% were female. Mean age of the patients was 28 14.3 (mean standard deviation) years. Of 152 patients, 48.7% were found to be nonadherent to their AED therapy. The most commonly identified factor was forgetfulness. Nonadherence was significantly associated with poor seizure control (P = 0.002). Conclusion:: Nonadherence to the AED is common among patients with epilepsy and affects seizure control adversely.
Copyright
Association for Helping Neurosurgical Sick People. This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Derivative-Non Commercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit.
Contents may not be used for commercial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives License, which permits unrestricted reproduction and distribution, for non-commercial purposes only; and use and reproduction, but not distribution, of adapted material for non-commercial purposes only, provided the original work is properly cited.
