WASHINGTON – Consider it the other drug problem: Millions of people don’t take their medicine correctly — or quit taking it altogether — and the consequences can be deadly.
On average, half of patients with chronic illnesses like heart disease or asthma skip doses or otherwise mess up their medication, says a report being issued later this week. It calls the problem a national crisis costing billions of dollars.
The government is preparing new steps to try to persuade patients and their doctors to do better.
But with contributors that range from too-hurried doctor visits to confusing pill bottles, there’s no easy solution.
“We go into this with some humility,” says Dr. Carolyn Clancy, director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, which is planning what she calls an “in your face” campaign to improve medication adherence. “It’s really pretty appalling how badly we do.”
This goes far beyond the issue of affording prescriptions. Often people buy their drugs but misunderstand what they’re supposed to take, or how. Or forget doses. Or start feeling better and toss the rest of the bottle. Or skip doses for fear of side effects.
It’s not just a problem of poverty or poor education. Even the rich and highly educated skip their medicine. Perhaps the most high-profile example is former President Bill Clinton, who stopped taking his cholesterol-lowering statin drug at some point and later needed open-heart surgery to avoid a major heart attack. Statins offer significant heart protection, but about half of patients on statins quit using them within a year.
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