Does treatment adherence correlates with health related quality of life? findings from a cross sectional study

Background: Although medication adherence and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) are two different outcome measures, it is believed that adherence to medication leads to an improvement in overall HRQoL. The study aimed to evaluate the association between medication adherence and HRQoL. Methods: A questionnaire-based cross-sectional study design was undertaken with hypertension patients attending public hospitals in Quetta city, Pakistan. HRQoL was measured by Euroqol EQ-5D. Medication adherence was assessed by the Drug Attitude Inventory. Descriptive statistics was used to tabulate demographic and disease-related information. Spearman's correlation was used to assess the association between the study variables. All analysis was performed using SPSS 17.0. Results: Among 385 study patients, the mean age (SD) was 39.02 (6.59), with 68.8% of males dominating the entire cohort. The mean (SD) duration of hypertension was 3.01 +/- 0.939 years. Forty percent (n = 154) had a bachelor's degree level of education with 34.8% (n = 134) working in the private sector. A negative and weak correlation (-0.77) between medication adherence and EQ-5D was reported. In addition, a negative weak correlation (-0.120) was observed among medication adherence and EQ-VAS. Conclusions: Correlations among the study variables were negligible and negative. Hence, there is no apparent relationship between the variables.