I must admit that I am guilty of not taking my medications sometimes. It’s not intentional really, but it does happen. It could seem like a simple thing missing, or not taking your meds. Right? It turns out that it could actually be life threatening ! Yes!
Following is a summary of a New York Times article. You can check and find out whether you are using these excuses for not taking your meds. Non-adherence to taking prescribed medications results in
50 % of prescriptions for chronic diseases not being taken as prescribed, typically people take only half of their prescribed doses.
- Approximately 125,000 deaths and 10 percent of hospitalizations are the cause of non-adherence to prescriptions. If the drugs are not taken correctly they do not work.
- A third of kidney transplant patients don’t take their anti- rejection medications. In addition, heart attack patients do not take their blood pressure meds. Moreover, children with asthma do not use their inhalers at all, or consistently.