Medication Adherence Among Nigerians with Schizophrenia: Correlation Between Clinico-Demographic Factors and Quality of Life

• Published in: Mental illness Vol. 9; no. 1; p. 6889
• Main Authors: Ogunnubi, Oluseun P, Olagunju, Andrew T, Aina, Olatunji F, Okubadejo, Njideka U
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Italy PAGEPress Publications, Pavia, Italy 22.03.2017; Wiley
• Subjects: Africa; Clinico-demographic; Medication Adherence; Schizophrenia; Wellbeing; Schizophrenia; Wellbeing; Medication Adherence; Clinico-demographic; Africa
• ISSN: 2036-7457; 2036-7465
• DOI: 10.4081/mi.2017.6889

Medication adherence contributes significantly to symptom remission, recovery and wellbeing in mental illnesses. We evaluated how medication adherence correlates with clinico-demographic factors and quality of life (QoL) in a sample of Nigerians with schizophrenia. This descriptive cross-sectional study involved 160 randomly selected participants with confirmed diagnosis of schizophrenia based on . Data on socio-demographic and clinical characteristics of participants were collected with a questionnaire. Medication adherence was assessed with , and participants completed the . The mean age of participants was 38.54 (±11.30) years, and all the participants were on antipsychotics, but only 45% were adherent to their medication. Out of all the participants, 45 (28.2%) considered their overall QoL to be good, 97 (60.6%) considered theirs to be fair, while 18 (11.2%) reported poor QoL. Medication non-adherence correlated negatively with good QoL across multiple dimensions including overall QoL ( =-0.175), health satisfaction (r=-0.161), physical (r=-0.186) and psychological domain (r=-0.175). Again, participant's age (r=-0.190) and age of onset of illness (r=-0.172) correlated negatively with medication non-adherence, and a trend towards relapse delay with medication adherence was also observed (r=-0.155). The effect size of these correlations were however small. Our findings suggest a link between medication adherence and QoL in schizophrenia, such that strategy that addresses medication non-adherence and its determinants may have potential benefits on wellbeing. Further hypotheses-driven studies are desirable.