ONCE-A-DAY IS BEST - EVIDENCE OR ASSUMPTION - THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN COMPLIANCE AND DOSAGE FREQUENCY IN OLDER-PEOPLE

To rationalise medication in the elderly, physicians often change mult iple dose regimens to once daily in the belief that this improves comp liance. Effective methods for measuring compliance have only come into use during the last decade. Partly as a result of this, high quality studies comparing once daily with other regimens in the elderly, are l acking. What evidence there is, from investigations which used subopti mum methods and/or mixed (elderly/younger) patient groups, does not ju stify the widely held view that 'once a day is best', particularly whe n compared with twice daily regimens.