Standardized method to assess medicines' acceptability: focus on paediatric population

Area of Science:

• Pharmacology and Pharmaceutics
• Patient Adherence Studies
• Health Services Research

Background:

• Assessing patient acceptance of medications is crucial for treatment success.
• Existing methods for evaluating medicine acceptability lack standardization.
• Understanding patient-reported outcomes related to medication use is vital.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel, standardized tool for evaluating medicine acceptability.
• To assess medication acceptability across diverse patient characteristics and medicine types.
• To provide a framework for objective and comparable acceptability evaluations.

Main Methods:

• Development of an acceptability map using objective measures from real-life medicine use.
• Application of Multiple Correspondence Analysis (MCA) for data mapping.
• Hierarchical classification on Principal Components (HCPC) for clustering distinct acceptability profiles.

Main Results:

• Analysis of 234 pediatric evaluations revealed four acceptability clusters: 'well-accepted' (50%), 'accepted' (19%), 'poorly accepted' (25%), and 'not accepted' (6%).
• 'Well-accepted' was defined by full dose intake and positive patient reaction.
• Distinctions between 'poorly accepted' and 'not accepted' were based on partial or non-intake of the required dose.

Conclusions:

• The developed tool, utilizing an acceptability map, allows for the evaluation of individual medicine profiles.
• This standardized approach facilitates appropriate acceptability assessment and comparison among different medications.
• The tool is expected to meet the need for reliable methods in medication acceptability research.