Article Sidebar
Article Details
Copyright remains in the Author’s name. The work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - Noncommercial Works License. Authors are required to complete and sign an Author Agreement form that outlines Author and Publisher rights and terms of publication. The Agreement form should be uploaded along with other submissions files and any submission will be considered incomplete without it [forthcoming].
Material submitted for publication in the SAMJ is accepted provided it has not been published or submitted for publication elsewhere. Please inform the editorial team if the main findings of your paper have been presented at a conference and published in abstract form, to avoid copyright infringement. The SAMJ does not hold itself responsible for statements made by the authors.
Previously published images
If an image/figure has been previously published, permission to reproduce or alter it must be obtained by the authors from the original publisher and the figure legend must give full credit to the original source. This credit should be accompanied by a letter indicating that permission to reproduce the image has been granted to the author/s. This letter should be uploaded as a supplementary file during submission.
Main Article Content
Quantifying non-compliance in patients receiving digoxin - a pharmacokinetic approach
Abstract
Non-compliance has a major influence on the successful outcome of a therapeutic regimen. It also unnecessarily increases the costs of health care. In a study involving 137 outpatients receiving digoxin 55 patients (40%) were found to be non-compliant. Patients who experienced communication probiems and who lacked a meaningful relationship with their doctor showed a marked deterioration in compliance. An applied pharmacokinetic approach was used to predict the serum digoxin concentration for each patient. The creatinine clearance was determined and the degree of severity of heart failure was assessed. Total body clearance was then calculated. The predicted concentration was also calculated and compared with the measured digoxin concentration enabling an objective assessment of compliance. Twentyfour of the non-compliant patients who had subtherapeutic levels of digoxin « 0,8 ng/ml) had signs of cardiac failure. Eighteen of these patients were receiving additional medication (1,7 ± 0,5 items) for the treatment of cardiac failure.
