Abstract
Purpose :
The most common barriers to patient compliance in glaucoma treatment are lack of self-confidence in patients in administering medicine properly and difficulty of drop administration. This prospective survey study will compare different techniques to increase compliance by increasing patient confidence and competency in administering their glaucoma medications. The techniques that will be tested here are giving a glaucoma dropper-aid device vs showing an instructional glaucoma drop administration video.
Methods :
In this study, we will conduct a pre and post-survey of glaucoma adherence questions, using the Morisky Medication Adherence Scale (MMAS-8) and the Quality of Life and Glaucoma 17-item questionnaire (GlauQoL-17). We grouped these individuals into either a control group with no intervention, a group given a glaucoma drop applicator with instructions on proper use, or another group showing a patient-provider education video on how to administer the drops properly at the clinic visit.
Patients will be given a post-glaucoma adherence survey questionnaire/satisfaction questionnaire 4 weeks post-intervention. Included are patients who are actively being treated for Primary Open Angle Glaucoma (POAG) at the UMass Memorial Eye clinic. Non-English speaking patients will be included only if their primary language is either Spanish or Portuguese because instructional videos were only provided in English, Spanish, and Portuguese. Exclusion criteria include the following:
- Individuals <18 years old
- Prisoners
- Adults unable to provide consent (adults lacking consent, nonverbal)
- Non-English speaking patients, besides Spanish and Portuguese
- First-time glaucoma drop users
Our target recruitment is 50 participants.
Outcomes:
1. Improvement in medication compliance based on patient responses to Morisky Medication Adherence Scale and the Quality of Life and Glaucoma 17-item questionnaire
Results :
Preliminary results are implying that patients who received video instruction or dropper-aid had an increase in adherence to glaucoma drops.
Conclusions :
We hope to show that intervention with technology such as dropper-aids or video instruction, helps increase patient compliance with glaucoma drop treatment. With limited physician-patient interactions, it is important to understand what the optimal tools are that will help patients increase medication compliance.
This abstract was presented at the 2022 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Denver, CO, May 1-4, 2022, and virtually.