Increasing patient adherence in antifungal infection treatment: once-daily dosing of sertaconazole.

Adherence to treatment is an important issue in all areas of clinical medicine, including dermatology. Consequences of poor compliance include reduced treatment benefits, biased assessments of treatment efficacy, increased healthcare costs, and in some cases even death. To date, even the most effective interventions in patients' habits have not led to large improvements in either adherence or treatment outcome. New objective electronic measures permit unbiased reporting of actual adherence to therapy regimens and have revealed that nonadherence is more pervasive than had been suspected, usually occurring when patients omit or delay a dose. In dermatology, adherence to therapy for dermatomycosis is known to decrease with the duration of treatment and the number of applications required each day, particularly once symptoms have disappeared. Simpler dosing regimens are sought for the treatment of cutaneous fungal infections. Sertaconazole, an imidazole antifungal, has pharmacokinetics that are considered favorable for once-daily antimycotic therapy. It is hypothesized that its prolonged dermal retention may translate into the need for less frequent application for successful treatment in clinical practice.