The effect of patient education with 10 year-cardiovascular risk on treatment compliance in patients with hypertension

Objective: It was aimed to investigate the effect of 10-year risk of cardiovascular disease on treatment compliance in adult patients with hypertension.Methods: The research is an observational study that was enrolled with 118 patients registered to a family physician in Izmir Balcova region. Treatment compliance of the patients was evaluated with the questionnaire which contained the Hill-Bone compliance to hypertension therapy scale. 10-year cardiovascular risk levels of the patients were established and told to them. Then they were asked to evaluate their own risk levels. The patients' weight, height and blood pressure were measured. Weight and blood pressure measurements were repeated and treatment compliance was evaluated after three months. SPSS 15.0 program was used for analysis and p<0.05 was accepted as significant.Results: The majority of the patients were women (67.8%). The most commonly used antihypertensive drug group was angiotensin receptor blockers (63.6%). Prehypertensive group was the majority in both interviews. The percentage of patients indicating perfect compliance was significantly increased in the second interview (p=0.003). Although most of the patients (57.6%) had high risk, the percentage of patients who evaluated themselves as low risk was high (55.1%).Conclusion: The evaluation of hypertensive patients for cardiovascular risk and treatment compliance may improve treatment compliance. Informing patients about cardiovascular risk is an applicable method for both patients and physicians and has vital importance at follow-up of high-risk hypertensive patients.