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58 active trials for Medication Adherence

Tools to Assess Medication Adherence

The issue of medication adherence (MA) has long been undestimated but is now growing interest due to both the increase of patients with chronic diseases and the aging of the population. According to the World Health Organization, only 50% of patients with chronic illnesses correctly follow physician's prescriptions in developed countries. Beyond the individual consequences that failure to adherence can engender (increased morbidity, mortality and hospitalizations), this concept also encompasses a collective dimension (risk of transmission of infectious diseases and increased health care costs). Today, improving MA would have more impact on human health than developping new medical therapies. That's why detecting non-adherence constitutes a major public health issue in which pharmacists play a significant role through medication reconciliation and patients' education. The methods wildly used are based on indirect measurement: questionnaires completed by the patient himself or the Medication Possession Ratio (MPR). Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages, but none is considered as the gold standard. The Montpellier University Hospital set up a MA self-report scale ranging from 0 (low) to 10 (high adherence) in the various care units where the clinical pharmacy activity is deployed. The purpose of this study was to assess the MA according to this numerical scale and the MPR calculation, and evaluate the correlation between these two methods.

Start: November 2019
CNTRP POSITIVE Study

Adequate control of immunosuppression is critical in preventing graft failure after solid organ transplantation (SOT) and in avoiding life-threatening viral and malignant complications. Prolonging patient and graft survival and delaying re-transplantation as children reach adulthood is critical to optimal use of a scarce resource. This requires tailoring post-transplant management to the unique needs of the child. Immunosuppression management is challenging in infants, children and youth. The interval from birth to young adulthood sees profound changes in physiological processes, body size and immune maturation; infancy and adolescence are the periods of most rapid and dramatic change. Three pivotal factors affect immunosuppression control in the child: 1) age-dependent variation in drug metabolism; 2) developmental changes in immune function with increased childhood susceptibility to infections, including those caused by viruses; and 3) behavioural changes in adolescence and young adulthood linked with poor treatment adherence. This project will identify the most important factors influencing immunosuppression control across the pediatric age range, from infancy to young adulthood, including age-related changes in drug metabolism, immune function, and susceptibility to viral infections, as well as health care system factors affecting treatment adherence. This is the first comprehensive, multi-organ transplant study to identify age-related biologic and health care systems determinants of variability in immunosuppression control in children and youth. Results will inform personalized age-appropriate strategies to improve immunosuppression control and reduce the unacceptably high graft failure and viral complication rates in this vulnerable population. The POSITIVE Study brings together researchers across Canada and is one of 6 projects and 3 cores that constitute the Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR) funded interdisciplinary research program called the Canadian National Transplant Research Program (CNTRP). The CNTRP is a national program designed to increase organ and tissue donation in Canada and enhance the survival and quality of life of Canadians who receive transplants. As a national program, CNTRP provides robust power for pediatric studies that would not otherwise be possible. While primarily focused on issues unique to a pediatric and young adult population, this study will interact closely with all other CNTRP projects. These reciprocal interactions will accelerate new discovery that can be cross-applied in different populations outside of pre-specified age groups. Interactions will ensure rapid knowledge transfer, uptake and dissemination into practice. This is the largest national cohort study of pediatric transplant patients to date in Canada, and it will create a longitudinal dataset with clinical and biological specimens linkable to transplant registries and provincial administrative datasets.

Start: April 2014
Lifestyle, Self-medication and Use of Nutraceuticals in a Population of Italian and Spanish Students

University students are considered a population class with a high risk of malnutrition and/or obesity, metabolic and cardiovascular diseases, with a tendency to misuse drugs and self-medication. The interest in a healthy diet can lead to a psychological obsession known as orthorexia, frequent among students in the biomedical field and in the sports context. The high levels of stress recorded in university students have been related to the use of drugs to enhance their cognitive abilities. The phenomenon of self-medication is one of the main problems for public health, with high levels recorded among students of health professions. A high adherence to the Mediterranean diet seems to bring health benefits, with an impact even on the intestinal microbiota composition. Although several studies have investigated the effect of the Mediterranean diet on intestinal microbiota, little attention has been paid to the effect of this diet on the oral microbiota, one of the most relevant microbial habitats from a clinical point of view. The aim of this study is to evaluate self-medication, adherence to the Mediterranean diet, the relationship between lifestyle and biomarkers of the metabolic and immunological status, and impact of eating habits on the oral microbiota composition. Students, doctoral students, post-docs and specialists in the biomedical and pharmaceutical fields will be recruited in Italy (N = 200) and in Spain (N = 200). Data will be collected through questionnaires in order to evaluate self-medication, eating habits, level of physical activity, orthorexia and lifestyle of the subjects. The entire group will be evaluated with clinical parameters of metabolic status and the quality of saliva and urine. The latter will be determining factors for the selection of 50 Italian and 50 Spanish students, on which parameters of immunological and antioxidant status, cortisol, urinary phenols, and the composition of the oral microbiota will be evaluated. Italian and Spanish students may have different eating habits and lifestyles. It is assumed that subjects with high adherence to the Mediterranean diet have a better metabolic and immunological status. Moreover, high rates of orthorexia are expected among students who practice sports. The composition of the oral microbiota could vary depending on the type of diet and consistently with the immunological status markers.

Start: July 2019