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Samuel Vaisrub, MD

JAMA. 1975;234(1):80-81.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

Noncompliance rarely entered into consideration when a physician prescribed a therapeutic regimen or evaluated its effects. It was assumed that a patient concerned about his illness stuck to his diet, took his medication regularly, and generally did what "the doctor ordered." Otherwise, why would he have come to the doctor in the first place?

The assumption may have been justified when the therapeutic transaction took place between a physician who cared and a patient who wanted to get better. But, is it still valid now when, as is often the case, an asymptomatic patient sees the doctor in the setting of some physician-instigated, community-initiated disease prevention project? Can we be confident that he will comply with the prescribed treatment?

Recent experience with mass screening for hypertension and the treatment of the identified asymptomatic hypertensive individuals suggests that such confidence may often be misplaced.

Sackett et al¹ conducted a randomized . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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