Profile of adherence to pharmacotherapy in elderly people in a pharmaceutical followup in Niterói

To evaluate the association between sociodemographic and health characteristics and therapeutic adherence in elderly individuals, this cross-sectional study used data from a project that studied the outcomes of pharmaceutical care for elderly individuals treated in a specialized center in Niterói/RJ. To assess the association between the characteristics of the elderly individuals and adherence, Fisher’s exact test was used, and crude and adjusted odds ratios of adherence in elderly individuals were obtained using a logistic model. The 95% confidence intervals were calculated for the odds ratios odds of chance. There was a significant difference in the percentage of adherence according to income, marital status, self-rated health and difficulty in remembering to take the medication. In the multivariate analysis, the chance of adherence in elderly individuals with a steady partner was 91.6% lower than the chance of adherence in elderly individuals without a steady partner (OR=0.084; p-value=0.012). Elderly people who reported having difficulty remembering to take the medication had a 91.6% lower chance of adherence than elderly people without this difficulty (OR=0.084; p-value=0.005). The marital situation of elderly individuals, such as living with a steady partner, and difficulty remembering to take the medication were factors associated with lower therapeutic adherence.