Table 3.

Key Differences in Themes between Patients and Caregivers

Themes and subthemes	Patients	Caregivers
Perceived effectiveness: objective improvement in clinical values	Relied on clinical values obtained at doctor’s visits or via formal testing	Relied on home readings
Adverse effects on quality of life: severity of side effects	Cited side effects that caused discomfort or adversely affected quality of life such as fatigue, dizziness, gastrointestinal upset, cramps, rash	Emphasized confusion or altered mental status
Adverse effects on quality of life: inconvenience associated with administration	Would stop a medication that is inconvenient to administer	Would encourage care recipient to continue medication despite inconvenience due to potential benefit
Adverse effects on quality of life: discomfort associated with administration	Would stop a medication that is uncomfortable to administer	Would encourage care recipient to continue medication despite inconvenience due to potential benefit
Strong relationship with the prescriber	Valued prescriber opinion but often placed more value on subjective or objective evidence	Placed trust in prescriber despite seeing NO improvement in form of improved symptoms or clinical values