Effect of regimen complexity on experiences of long-term medicines use
Research type
Research Study
Full title
The effect of regimen complexity on patients' experiences of using long-term medicines
IRAS ID
212550
Contact name
Janet Krska
Contact email
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 5 months, 29 days
Research summary
Many people in England are taking ever increasing numbers of medicines. There are a number of reasons for this, such as higher numbers of older people, living longer, most of whom have multiple medical conditions, as well as the increasing numbers of national guidelines which recommend medicines should be used to prevent further conditions developing. Some people find it difficult to cope with the number of medicines they have to use and we need to know more about how health professionals can help to reduce this burden.
This study will try to find out whether patients’ perceived burden of using medicines is related to how complex their overall pattern of medicines use is. We will use a questionnaire designed to measure the burden of long-term medicines use from the patient’s perspective, which covers the issues patients say are important to them. We know that burden increases with number of medicines, from our earlier work with this questionnaire.
To measure complexity, we will need patients’ permission to obtain a list of their prescription medicines with their name and address removed. We will measure the complexity of the prescription in a standard way, which takes account of the number of medicines, how often they are used, how they have to be used and any other important instructions which patients should follow.
We will invite people handing in prescriptions to study pharmacies in Kent and Medway to take part, after checking that the prescription is for them and is for long-term medicines. The pharmacist will provide the list of medicines for those who have agreed and the patient will be given the questionnaire to take home, fill in and return at their leisure. We will then match questionnaire with prescriptions, to assess whether increasing complexity results in higher patient burden.REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - Sheffield Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
16/YH/0413
Date of REC Opinion
7 Oct 2016
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion