When patients don’t take their medication: how to tackle non-adherence

What you can do to help reduce medicines wastage and improve patients’ health

• The financial and personal health burden of medication non-adherence is huge – and has remained virtually unchanged for many years
• The reasons why patients don’t take medicines as prescribed are various and complex, including confusion over regimens, reluctance to accept diagnosis and busy lives
• How you can help improve adherence and well-being by taking into account patients’ individual needs and circumstances

Up to half of all medication prescribed for long-term conditions is not taken as prescribed, according to the National Institute for Health and