The relevance of compliance to medical treatment Compliance in medicine is the need for the patient to play an active part in his or her own recovery

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The relevance of compliance to medical treatment

Compliance in medicine is the need for the patient to play an active part in his or her own recovery from an illness. Patients that do not follow a specified treatment plan are considered non-compliant. In order for a patient to achieve good health, it is important for the patient to follow the guidelines set down by medical practitioners. Non compliance can come in many forms from refusing to take medicine to the lack of understanding of the patient's condition and the long lasting effects this may have on their health. In order to improve the situation it's important to look at why people find it difficult to follow medical advice and to find out ways of improving the situation.

Compliance can be seen as one of the most important factors regarding a patient's recovery from an illness to achieve this it is important to gain an insight to the problems that are faced from a psychological point of view. A good example of this can be found as a result of studies made by Sarafino (1994). He explored the prospect regarding how much people adhere to medical treatment proscribed to them by health care workers. He found that most people customise their treatment to fit around their own lifestyles. If the patients conforming to the treatment could have a negative change on the person's lifestyle they are more likely not to conform. He found that people only adhere to 78% of short-term treatments and 54% for chronic conditions. A reason for this is that patients may feel that the illness in which they are suffering from really is not that bad or maybe the medical practitioner has a lack of knowledge regarding the illness or may have got the diagnosis wrong. In some cases it is possible for the person to become comfortable with the level of their illness or even to have conditioned themselves to cope with the pain in which they may be suffering from. Sarafino also recognised that patients often felt that the medical treatment which they were receiving was having little or no effect on their long term health, this can be put down to the treatment not working as fast as the patient had expected. Although some people may be worried about the more simple unpleasant side effects of drugs and even the needles that in some cases are used to administer the drugs, this can be a massive hurdle for patients to over come. The Doctors and nurses being confident in their knowledge can rectify this, also, being friendly and approachable will have a positive effect by making the patient feeling more comfortable to be spoken to and allowed to administer the treatment with out complications. By making surgery's a less threatening environment, and removing visual barriers, for example a desk in-between the professional and the patient, would make the service user feel more at ease. With the use of softer decoration and a not so sterile look would make the surgery a more comfortable, pleasant and welcoming place to receive treatment in. The Patient may feel more willing to listen and understand what is being discussed with them because it is less threatening. There are also the more practical problems of treatments such as the cost of prescriptions or getting to the hospital or surgery, some families or older people may find this difficult to afford. Or just find it hard to fit appointments into their busy lifestyles.
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While other psychologists such as (Baret et al 2001) found that people don't like to take anymore then 3 drugs at a time without a better understanding of the drug. These issues can leave us with major problems as health care workers. If people do not take medical treatment as required this can cause implications on the health service itself. For instance if a person refused to have a flu jab, and three months down the line contracted flu which later turned in to phenomena. This could result in a lengthy stay in hospital to recover, this also ...

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