ABSTRACT

Pharmacy practice serves to facilitate the appropriate use of medicines. In traditional approaches to clinical pharmacy it was thought that this could be achieved by helping to ensure that individual patients received the ‘correct medicine in the correct dose at the correct time’. However, providing a patient with the appropriate medication is only the first stage in the therapeutic process. The patient then has to use the medicine in a way that ensures optimum benefit. If one assumes that the prescription was evidence-based and appropriate, then presumably this will be achieved by following the prescribed’s instructions. However it is thought that at least a third of all prescribed medication is not taken as directed.