The biomedical model of health and illness remains a dominant perspective in many health care settings
and organizations.The biomedical approach to adherence assumes that patients are more-or-less
passive followers of their doctor’s orders, further to a diagnosis and prescribed therapy (52,53). Nonadherence
is understood in terms of characteristics of the patient (personality traits, sociodemographic
background), and patient factors are seen as the targets of efforts to improve adherence.This approach
has helped to elucidate the relationships between disease and treatment characteristics on the one
hand, and adherence on the other.Technological innovations (e.g. assessing levels of adherence using
biochemical measures, developing new devices to administer medications) have had this as their impetus.
However, other important factors, such as patients’ views about their symptoms or their medications
have been largely ignored.