Length of the treatment and number of doses per day as major determinants of child adherence to acute treatment.
OBJECTIVE
To determine the rate of aftercare adherence to prescriptions from a paediatric emergency department and to identify predictors for nonadherence.


METHODS
Patients discharged from a French paediatric emergency department with at least one oral drug prescription were included. A telephone interview questionnaire was used to determine whether the child had received the treatments according to the prescription. Adherence was assessed according to three items: frequency of drug administration, length of treatment and drug administering method. Complete adherence was defined as adherence to the three items mentioned above, and nonadherent as nonadherent to at least one of the items. Influence of age, sex, pathology, language spoken at home, type of medical insurance, type of medication prescribed, diagnosis, dissatisfaction with the explanation of the medical problem, number of prescribed medications, length of the treatment and number of doses per day was assessed.


RESULTS
One hundred and five telephone interviews were exploited. The children were 60 boys (57%) and 45 girls (43%). The ages of these 105 children were between 0.2 and 12 years. The most common diagnoses were asthma and pulmonary infection. Complete adherence with the prescription was 36.2%. Three factors were significantly associated with nonadherence (p < 0.05): length of treatment, number of doses per day and male sex.


CONCLUSIONS
This study suggests that simplifying treatment schedules is an effective strategy for improving compliance in paediatric emergency departments.
Chappuy
H
H
Service d'Urgences Pédiatriques, Hôpital Necker Enfants Malades, Assistance Publique Hôpitaux de Paris, Paris, France. helene.chappuy@nck.aphp.fr
Tréluyer
J-M
JM
Faesch
S
S
Giraud
C
C
Chéron
G
G
D002648:Child; D002652:Child Behavior; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004334:Drug Administration Schedule; D004636:Emergency Service, Hospital; D005260:Female; D005602:France; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008297:Male; D055553:Prescription Drugs / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012737:Sex Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D016903:Drug Monitoring
D055553:Prescription Drugs