by Carolyn Thomas  ♥ @HeartSisters

Compliant is one of those words that makes my skin crawl. It’s the word that our doctors use to describe good patients who take their prescribed medications exactly as ordered. The Teenage Cancer Trust’s Simon Davies in the U.K. once described the C-word (and its ever-so-slightly less patronizing alternative adherent) as words that “sound like they have punishment at the end of them.”

But for most physicians, both words mean the same thing: a serious health care issue. That’s because when patients refuse or stop taking the medicine their doctors have prescribed to help manage a serious medical condition, the consequences are often devastating.  From organ transplant recipients to those living with chronic diagnoses like diabetes, heart disease, epilepsy, HIV or Hepatitis C, those consequences can be swift and sometimes even fatal.  Continue reading “Why don’t patients take their meds as prescribed?” →