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Table 2 Thematic Content Analysis of Factors Relevant to Patients' Satisfaction With Their Medication Use
| Content Area | Prevailing Themes and Sub-Themes |
|---|---|
| Medication Effectiveness | • The eye pressure readings are the only way one can tell |
| • Some report improvements in their vision, including: | |
| Ability to read (small print) without glasses | |
| Vision is clearer/not as blurred or cloudy | |
| Distance vision is clearer | |
| Able to see better at night | |
| Unintended Medication Effects | • Burning, Itching, Grittiness/Sandiness, Dryness, Tearing of eyes |
| • Redness of eye, Darkening of iris of eyes | |
| • Swelling, Crustiness, Stickiness of eyelids | |
| • Visual Changes (e.g., "clear ropes" in eyes, loss of center of vision, sensitivity to light) | |
| • Systemic affects associated with allergenic reaction or use of oral treatments: shortness of breath, restlessness/inability to sleep, excessive perspiration, low energy, migraines | |
| Convenience and Ease of Medication Use | • Discomfort putting things in eyes |
| • Strong "blink reflex" making it difficult to instill the drops | |
| • Difficulty learning to instill drops | |
| • Miss the eye when administering the medicine | |
| • Unable to feel whether a drop has gone into their eye | |
| • Inadvertently dispense more than one drop, or dispense just one more to be sure | |
| • Require assistance if elderly or physically impaired (e.g., have Parkinson's) | |
| • Trouble remembering to use the medicine, particularly on trips or vacations | |
| • Instillation twice a day, this is less convenient than once | |
| • Frustration with the daily dosing and, as a result, sometimes not taking their medicine | |
| • More inconvenient to administer evening than morning doses, sometimes too tired in evening | |
| • Delay taking medication in evening till returning home | |
| • Difficult to tell when their medicine is about to run out |
