Interventions to Promote Oral Medication Adherence in the Pediatric Chronic Illness Population: A Systematic Review From the Children’s Oncology Group

Coyne KD, Trimble KA, Lloyd A, Petrando L, Pentz J, Van Namen K, Fawcett A, Laing CM. Interventions to Promote Oral Medication Adherence in the Pediatric Chronic Illness Population: A Systematic Review From the Children’s Oncology Group. J Pediatr Oncol Nurs. 2019 May/Jun;36(3):219-235. doi: 10.1177/1043454219835451. Epub 2019 Apr 4. PubMed PMID: 30943831; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC6487845.

Pediatric oncology protocols frequently include multiple oral medications administered at varied dosing schedules, often for prolonged periods of time. Nonadherence to protocol-directed oral medications may place patients at increased risk for morbidity and mortality. The purpose of this systematic review was to evaluate the existing body of evidence to determine best-practice recommendations regarding interventions for oral medication adherence in children and adolescents with cancer. Twenty-four articles were systematically reviewed and evaluated according to the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation criteria; 2 studies focused on the pediatric oncology population, and the remaining 22 studies focused on other chronic illnesses of childhood. A variety of interventions to increase oral medication adherence in children were identified, including pill swallowing, technology, incentivization, education-based intervention, psychosocial support-based intervention, and combination intervention. Most interventions were shown to have some benefit in pediatrics, most in the non-oncology setting. The overall synthesis of the literature indicates that nonadherence to oral medications is a prevalent problem in pediatrics, and much work is needed to address this problem, particularly in pediatric oncology.