Impact of pharmacist-led collaborative patient education on medication adherence and quality of life of schizophrenia patients in a tertiary care setting

Schizophrenia is a chronic mental-disorder and one of the top 10 causes of disability globally. Nearly 4.3 million people suffer from schizophrenia in India but very few visit a hospital for diagnosis or treatment. Of those patients who receive treatment, medication non-adherence and decreased quality of life (QOL) are the major problems. The objective of study was to assess the impact of pharmacist-led collaborative patient education on medication adherence and QOL in schizophrenia patients in a psychiatry out-patient setting of a tertiary-care setting. Patients were randomized into two groups. Interventional patients received medication review, followed by patient education session using Patient-Information Leaflets (PILs) developed for the study. Control patients received usual-care. Patients data were collected at the beginning of the study and after each follow-up of one-month interval, till 3rd follow-up. Medication adherence and QOL were assessed using Medication Adherence Rating Scale and WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire respectively. Twenty-three patients completed the study, 13 were in the intervention and 10 in the control group. Majority of the study subjects were of age group 18-39 years (69.56%) and female (65.21%). Medication adherence mean improvement was 0.7 ± 0.67 and 1.75 ± 0.2 in control and intervention groups respectively. Similarly, mean QOL improvement was 16.12 ± 1.98 and 24.17 ± 0.3 in control and intervention groups respectively. Statistically significant improvement in the mean medication adherence and QOL was observed in the intervention group. Results showed that pharmacist-psychiatrist collaborative care can significantly improve patients' medication adherence and QOL.