Date of Award

2018

Embargo Period

8-1-2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

College

College of Nursing

First Advisor

Gail Stuart

Second Advisor

Ronald Acierno

Third Advisor

E. Baron Short

Abstract

Research suggests that medication adherence among individuals with mental health problems is problematic. The issue of medication non-adherence among this population is consistent among the different mental health diagnoses. Numerous factors contribute to medication non-adherence: patient issues, service delivery issues, and issues related to the measurement of medication adherence, which lacks a gold standard. This dissertation is a compendium of three manuscripts that represent three distinct but related studies on medication adherence among individuals with mental health challenges. The first manuscript is an integrative review that seeks to assess the validity, reliability, and levels of evidence of existing instruments for measuring medication adherence in patients with schizophrenia. The second is another integrative review that examines literature in the past decade (2006-2016) on the use of mobile phone contacts (MPC) in individuals with severe mental illness to improve medication adherence after hospital discharge. The third, a descriptive correlational study, examines mental health services (MHS) users’ preferred MPC delivery method when receiving support to increase medication adherence after discharge. The findings from the first integrative review show the importance of validating medication adherence measures in this population. Findings from the second show the extent to which MPC support the increase of medication adherence in this population. Findings from the third show the importance of identifying patients’ preferences for an MPC method when providing support to increase medication adherence in this population. The findings of the two integrative reviews and the descriptive correlational study are integrated at the conclusion of the dissertation.

Rights

All rights reserved. Copyright is held by the author.

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