Effect of the Community Re-entry Program on Medication Adherence in Patients with Bipolar Disorder Type I

Drug adherence is poor among patients with bipolar I disorder (BID) and lack of adherence to medication is one of the frequent causes of relapse and readmission in these patients. This study aimed to examine the effect of a community re-entry rehabilitation program on drug adherence in patients with BID.
This randomized clinical trial study was conducted on all patients with BID admitted to Iran Psychiatric Haspital in the first 6 months of 2016. Forty patients were selected by purposive sampling and randomly divided into two groups of intervention and control. The intervention group received the theoretical and practical training of the community re-entry program (CRP) over 16 sessions (three times a week). Pateints in the control group only received current treatment at the center (drug therapy, occupational therapy, and psychotherapy). The patients completed medication adherence rating scale (MARS) before and threre months after the intervention. Data were analyzed using chi-square test, independent t-test and ANOVA with the SPSS 19 software.
The results showed no significant difference between the intervention and control groups regarding the distribution of demographic charactristics. The mean score of patients’medication adherence before the intervention was 4.05 ± 1.05 in the intervention group and 4.35 ± 1.59 in the control group, while after the intervention it was 8.31 ± 0.92 in the intervention group and 4.65 ± 1.56 in the control group, which showed a significant difference in the intervention group (P ≤ 0.001).
Results showed that implementing CRP can enhance drug adherence in patients with BID.