<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//NLM//DTD JATS (Z39.96) Journal Publishing DTD v1.2d1 20170631//EN" "JATS-journalpublishing1.dtd">
<article xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" dtd-version="1.0" article-type="healthcare" lang="en"><front><journal-meta><journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">IJCRR</journal-id><journal-id journal-id-type="nlm-ta">I Journ Cur Res Re</journal-id><journal-title-group><journal-title>International Journal of Current Research and Review</journal-title><abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="pubmed">I Journ Cur Res Re</abbrev-journal-title></journal-title-group><issn pub-type="ppub">2231-2196</issn><issn pub-type="opub">0975-5241</issn><publisher><publisher-name>Radiance Research Academy</publisher-name></publisher></journal-meta><article-meta><article-id pub-id-type="publisher-id">408</article-id><article-id pub-id-type="doi"/><article-id pub-id-type="doi-url"/><article-categories><subj-group subj-group-type="heading"><subject>Healthcare</subject></subj-group></article-categories><title-group><article-title>MEDICATION ADHERENCE AND ITS CORRELATES AMONG DIABETIC AND HYPERTENSIVE PATIENTS SEEKING CARE FROM PRIMARY HEALTH CENTER, INDIA&#13;
</article-title></title-group><contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Thekkur</surname><given-names>Pruthu</given-names></name></contrib><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Reddy</surname><given-names>Mahendra M.</given-names></name></contrib><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Ramaswamy</surname><given-names>Gomathi</given-names></name></contrib><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Naik</surname><given-names>Bijaya Nanda</given-names></name></contrib><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Lakshminarayanan</surname><given-names>Subitha</given-names></name></contrib><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Saya</surname><given-names>Ganesh Kumar</given-names></name></contrib></contrib-group><pub-date pub-type="ppub"><day>11</day><month>11</month><year>2015</year></pub-date><volume>)</volume><issue/><fpage>33</fpage><lpage>40</lpage><permissions><copyright-statement>This article is copyright of Popeye Publishing, 2009</copyright-statement><copyright-year>2009</copyright-year><license license-type="open-access" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"><license-p>This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) Licence. You may share and adapt the material, but must give appropriate credit to the source, provide a link to the licence, and indicate if changes were made.</license-p></license></permissions><abstract><p>Introduction: Low adherence to prescribed medication in patients with non communicable diseases (NCDs) increases risk of hospitalization and premature mortality. Assessing adherence to medications and its correlates among NCD patients can help in delivering targeted interventions.&#13;
Objectives: To assess the level of low adherence to prescribed medications and associated factors among diabetic and/or hypertensive patients registered in NCD clinic at a Rural Health Center in South India.&#13;
Methodology: A facility based cross-sectional study was conducted in a RHC of Puducherry, India. All the patients who registered and attended clinic for follow up in August 2014, with either hypertension and/or diabetes and received drug for more than four weeks prior to contact were included in study and adherence was assessed using Morisky Medication Adherence Scale (MMAS-8) questionnaire. The data was entered in Microsoft Excel and was analyzed using SPSS version 20.&#13;
Results: Of the 281 included in the study the mean (SD) age was 57.4 (11.9) years and 169 (59.8%) were females. Among these 281, 155 (55.1%) had only hypertension, 46 (16.4%) had only diabetes and 90 (28.5%) had both hypertension and diabetes. Low adherence to medication was seen in 47 (16.7%) participants. In the model factors like education of 1-5years (OR-2.68, CI-1.03__ampersandsignndash;6.98)), education of __ampersandsigngt;6 years (OR-3.50, CI-1.34__ampersandsignndash;9.14), having only diabetes (OR-3.78, CI-1.28-11.17) and tobacco use (3.51, CI-1.24__ampersandsignndash;9.96) were independently associated with low adherence.&#13;
Conclusion: Around one-sixth of the patients with either diabetes and/or hypertension were found to be less adherent to prescribed medication. Higher education levels, use of tobacco and having only diabetes were identified independently as risk factors for low adherence.&#13;
</p></abstract><kwd-group><kwd>Diabetes Mellitus</kwd><kwd> Hypertension</kwd><kwd> Medication compliance</kwd><kwd> Non communicable diseases</kwd><kwd> Primary health care</kwd></kwd-group></article-meta></front></article>
