A community-based Cross-Sectional Survey of Primaquine Adherence in Jambi Province, Indonesia

Background: Plasmodium vivax is one of malaria parasite species that can lead to life-threatening disease. Primaquine is the only known and licensed drug prominently against Plasmodium vivax hypnozoites stage. However, lack studies have demonstrated community adherence information to such particular treatment medication. Material and Method: A cross-sectional community-based study design was used in the study. The study population is the person visiting local primary health care with signs or symptoms related to malaria and detected microscopically with Plasmodium vivax infection. After prescribed with a standard dose of primaquine, adherence was measured by a structured questionnaire at the end of the completion day of the medication course. Results: Malaria caused by Plasmodium vivax in Lembah masurai sub-district started to be prevalent from 2014 to the end of 2017. The data indicated that malaria foci have been maintained in the area in the past five years. A total of 44 individuals were recruited in the study. In total, 11.4 % of the patients were certain non-adherence, 27.3% were probable non-adherence and 61.4% were probable adherence. Primaquine prescription is associated with non-adherence behavior (P-value = 0.044, OR: 8 [CI: 0.81-79.02]). Conclusion: Our study concludes that simplifying primaquine medication therapy by not adding another non-related drug may elevate the adherence level.