NEW YORK (Reuters Health) -
One in three people who are
prescribed medications may never get them filled, a new study
in patients being treated for skin conditions has found.

Therefore, when a prescribed treatment fails doctors should
consider that a patient may not have purchased the medication
in the first place, Dr. Andreas Storm of Copenhagen University
Hospital in Bispebjerg, Denmark, and colleagues conclude.

They used the Danish National Electronic Pharmacy Register,
which includes all prescriptions purchased within the past two
years across the country, to determine if a group of patients
prescribed new medications had actually gotten them filled.

Their analysis included 322 people who were prescribed a
total of 390 medications. Four weeks after receiving the
prescription, 30.7 percent of the patients had not filled it,
the researchers found.

Most people who did buy the medication did so within a week
of receiving the prescription.

Older patients were more likely to fill their
prescriptions, as were patients who had seen specialists.
People with chronic illnesses were less likely than those with
short-term conditions to get a prescription filled; for
example, 44.2 percent of patients with psoriasis didn't fill
their prescriptions, compared to just 12.2 percent of those
with infections. Patients were also less likely to fill
prescriptions for topical medications than for pills.

One approach for encouraging patients to fill their
prescription could involve contacting them by phone, mail or in
person, ideally one week after the medication has been
prescribed, the researchers say. And they think doctors should
set up appointments to follow up with patients, instead of
writing additional prescriptions.

SOURCE: Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology,
July 2008.