ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Medication treatment compliance among bipolar patients is quite widespread. OBJECTIVES: Treatment compliance depends on multiple factors. The aim of this study was to evaluate the predicting factors of noncompliance in patients with bipolar I disorder admitted to an Iranian hospital during a six-month follow up period. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This cross-sectional study included 47 bipolar I disorder subjects who were admitted to the Iran psychiatric hospital and that were chosen using a non-randomized convenient sampling model. The patients were assessed at baseline, and at two and six months after admission. For evaluating the patients, we used the medication possession ratio (MPR), the drug attitude inventory (DIA-10), the young mania rating scale (Y-MRS) and the scale for the assessment of positive symptoms (SAPS). The data were analyzed using a general linear model by SPSS 16 software. RESULTS: The repeated measures analysis revealed that medication compliance increased successively (P = 0.045), and age, gender and symptom severity did not alter the pattern. CONCLUSIONS: There is an increasing pattern in treatment compliance in bipolar I disorder patients, regardless of the known predicting factors for nonadherence.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: The Bipolar Disorder Patients Follow-up (BDPF) project is a longitudinal, prospective and naturalistic study. The purpose of the present report is to introduce the project, elaborate its methods, and present the reliability data of the utilized symptoms rating scales. METHODS: The sampling started in May 2008 and is still in progress. The probands are assessed at the beginning of the sampling and then 2 and 6 months later and then every 6 months using several instruments to identify psychiatric comorbidities, symptoms severity, quality of life, attempted suicide rate, treatment compliance, and some other factors. RESULTS: The results could lead to increase the clinicians' awareness about the clinical picture of this disorder in Iranian patients. CONCLUSIONS: The present project could decrease to some extent the current shortcomings in Iran's psychiatric data at least about one of the major psychiatric disorders known as the eighth result which cause medical disability over the world.
