Studies from National Health Insurance Service Update Current Data on Hypertension (Multilevel Analysis of the Relationship Between Prescribing Institutions and Medication Adherence Among Patients With Hypertension and Diabetes in Korea): Cardiovascular Diseases and Conditions – Hypertension

2023 DEC 14 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at NewsRx Diabetes Daily -- Research findings on hypertension are discussed in a new report. According to news originating from Wonju, South Korea, by NewsRx editors, the research stated, “This study investigated the relationship between prescribing institutions and medication adherence among patients newly diagnosed with hypertension and diabetes.”

The news journalists obtained a quote from the research from National Health Insurance Service: “This study investigated patients with new prescriptions for hypertension and diabetes in Korea in 2019 with using data collected from general health screenings. A multilevel logistic regression model was applied to explore the relationship between patients’ first prescribing institution and their medication adherence, defined as a medication possession ratio (MPR) over 80%. The overall adherence rates were 53.7% and 56.0% among patients with hypertension and diabetes, respectively. The intraclass correlation coefficients were 13.2% for hypertension and 13.8% for diabetes (p<0.001), implying that the first prescribing institution had a significant role in medication adherence. With clinics as the reference group, all other types of hospitals showed an odds ratio (OR) less than 1.00, with the lowest for tertiary hospitals (OR, 0.30 for hypertension; 0.45 for diabetes), and the next lowest in health screening specialized clinics (OR, 0.51 for hypertension; 0.46 for diabetes). Among individual-level variables, female sex, older age, higher insurance premium level, and residing in cities were positively associated with adherence in both the hypertension and diabetes samples.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “This study showed that the prescribing institution had a significant relationship with medication adherence. When the first prescribing institution was a clinic, newly diagnosed patients were more likely to adhere to their medication. These results highlight the important role played by primary care institutions in managing mild chronic diseases.”

For more information on this research see: Multilevel Analysis of the Relationship Between Prescribing Institutions and Medication Adherence Among Patients With Hypertension and Diabetes in Korea. Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health, 2023,56(6):504-514. (Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health - https://www.jpmph.org/). The publisher for Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health is Korean Society for Preventive Medicine.

A free version of this journal article is available at https://doi.org/10.3961/jpmph.23.252.

Our news editors report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Haryeom Ghang, Health Insurance Research Institute, National Health Insurance Service, Wonju, South Korea. Additional authors for this research include Juhyang Lee. Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.