Antihypertensive medication compliance in African-American stroke patients: behavioral epidemiology and interventions.

Hypertension is a major cause of stroke in the African-American community, and lack of control of hypertension appears to be common. Improving compliance to antihypertensive therapy in African-American stroke patients could have a significant impact on recurrent stroke rates. Little is known about factors affecting compliance in this community and which interventions would be effective in improving compliance. Health behavior models which assess the patient's perception of stroke and hypertension, barriers to the desired behavior, perception of ability to perform the behavior, perception of others' acceptance of the behavior and the patient's behavioral stage could be used to tailor interventions to improve compliance. A plan to improve compliance should take into account the target population's baseline rates of compliance, perception of need for intervention and risk factors for noncompliance.