Patient Prefer Adher
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Patient Prefer Adher · Feb 2008
Quality of life assessment in clinical research on Chinese medicine: Early experience and outlook.
Patients' own account of the clinical progress is particularly important in situations of pain control, mental disturbances, and chronic problems. Chinese medicine does not directly target against a symptom or pathology, but emphasizes the maintenance of harmony between the vital forces of an individual. To achieve the harmony, usually long-termed treatment is required by consideration of the changing seasons and subject's constitution nature. ⋯ Early attempts to develop an additional system to cover the need for Chinese medicine have been scanty. A lot of effort needs to be given before a practical instrument taking care of both the general domains of common interests and special feelings on health, relevant to Chinese medicine, could be established and made available. Users of Chinese medicine have to rely on generally acceptable yard-sticks with the addition of self-reporting symptoms unique to Chinese medicine.
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Allergen immunotherapy (IT) is an effective treatment of respiratory allergy, but requires strict rules of performance. This makes compliance particularly relevant, but thus far only a few studies have investigated this issue. ⋯ Adequate education of patients and optimization of administration schedules, with fine balancing between dose effectiveness and cost, are the factors most likely to achieve further improvement of compliance with IT.
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Patient Prefer Adher · Feb 2008
Effect of shared decision-making on therapeutic alliance in addiction health care.
In recent decades, shared decision-making (SDM) models have been developed to increase patient involvement in treatment decisions. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of a shared decision-making intervention (SDMI) for substance-dependent patients on patients' and clinicians' perceptions of therapeutic alliance. ⋯ The present study has shown that a specific intervention to enhance shared decision-making results in favorable changes in clinicians' perceptions of the therapeutic alliance.
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Patient Prefer Adher · Feb 2008
Comparison of prescriber evaluations and patient-directed self-reports in office-based practice for buprenorphine treatment of opiate-dependent individuals in France, 2002.
The objective of this cross-sectional evaluation study was to compare data generated through prescriber assessments, and data generated from independent direct contact with opiate-dependent patients in office-based practice to evaluate buprenorphine treatment for modality of buprenorphine absorption, benzodiazepine use, and depressive symptoms. A group of buprenorphine office-based practice prescribers was selected to participate in this study. They were asked to screen for inclusion all their patients coming for a visit from February to August 2002. ⋯ The sensitivity and specificity as well as the positive and negative predictive values of prescriber collected information were compared to that of their patients'. There was an overall good correlation between both data sources on the procedures for buprenorphine use especially for intravenous use of buprenorphine. There were important variations: obtaining buprenorphine without a prescription or with a prescription made by another doctor, intravenous administration of buprenorphine, use of benzodiazepines, and depression were underestimated by prescribers.
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Patient Prefer Adher · Feb 2008
Brief report: Characteristics of antidepressant use in patients with heart failure.
Depression is common in heart failure (HF), but there is little data on the characteristics of antidepressant use in patients with HF. ⋯ The findings from this survey study provide insight into the characteristics of antidepressant use in patients with HF and argue for better follow up of HF patients who are prescribed antidepressants.