Adherence to Antipsychotic Therapy: Risk and Protective Factors

Adherence can be defi ned as the extent to which a patient’s behavior coincides with prescribed health advice. Non-adherence is multifactorial and can include failure to take any medication, taking erroneous doses, failure to fi ll prescriptions, taking medication at the incorrect times, adhering partially to the prescribed medication regimen, and/or consuming incorrect combinations of medication (Pogge, Singer, & Harvey, 2005). Research has shown that medication adherence is one of the single most important factors in delaying or preventing relapse among adults with psychosis. For example, in one study the authors noted that within one year, patients who had medication gaps of 30 days or longer were four times more likely to be hospitalized (Weiden, Kozma, Grogg, & Locklear, 2004). While there is ample research on the rates and the importance of adherence to antipsychotics in adults, there is little information about medication use and treatment adherence among children and adolescents with psychosis.