The figure is roughly 50%, and it has held steady across decades and health systems. When people are asked why, the answers are rarely about memory.
The real reasons
- Side effects nobody warned them about. A statin that causes muscle aches is far more likely to be abandoned if the ache arrives as a surprise.
- No felt benefit. Antihypertensives are the clearest case — you cannot feel high blood pressure, so you cannot feel it being treated.
- Beliefs about medicines in general. Concerns about dependency and about long-term harm are widespread and often go unspoken in a seven-minute appointment.
- Complexity. Four medicines at three different times of day is a scheduling problem, not a memory problem.
What we can do about it
Ask us for a structured medicines review. It is free, it takes about twenty minutes, and it exists precisely for this. We will go through what each medicine is for, what it should and should not be doing to you, and whether anything on the list has outlived its purpose.
We can also simplify: aligning doses to fewer times of day, switching formulations where a tablet is hard to swallow, and synchronising your repeats so everything arrives together rather than in four separate visits.
Tell us you have stopped taking something. We are not here to be disappointed in you — we cannot help with a list that is not true.
The thing we most want you to know
If a medicine is causing a problem, there is nearly always an alternative. Stopping quietly is common and understandable, and it leaves your prescriber managing you on the assumption you are taking something you are not. That is where the real risk sits.
