Psychotropic medication compliance of adolescents in rehabilitation centers: A dual assessment by the educator and the adolescent himself
Psychotropic medication in rehabilitation centers is a common phenomenon that leads to the question of the adolescents' compliance toward this medication. To assess compliance to psychotropic medication, we first developed and validated the “ECAOPP”, a behavior and attitude evaluation self-rating scale regarding compliance to psychotropic medication (Laurier & Lafortune, 2007). Then, we developed and validated a complementary measure, the “ECOPP-Obs”, which brought an outside view (from their educators, or a third party) on the adolescents' compliance. The final version of this scale, presented in this article, has good psychometric properties; it includes six items in a unique factor measuring the compliance behaviors to prescribed medications. After the observation of those two measures (selfevaluation of compliance and evaluation from a third party), the results from “ECOPP-Obs” are compared to those of the “ECAOPP” for 104 dyads “adolescent-educator”. Then, further analyses are performed to interpret the divergences between information from the adolescents and that given by their educators. It seems that the scores of both scales are positively correlated, but only moderately. The study of the divergences allows for the creation of a variable expressing the “difference between self-rating compliance and compliance evaluated by a third party”. From these analyses, it appears that adolescents from cities are rated in a more severe way by their educators while they reported a good compliance, when they are compared to adolescents from suburbs or countries. Meanwhile, there was no difference in term of age, gender, results from behavior and symptomatic scales (Youth Self Report YSR; Teacher Report Form TRF; Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale for Children BPRS-C).