Background Adherence to HIV treatment is crucial to avoid the illness progressing or drug resistance appearing.

Purpose The aim of this study is to assess the compliance with triple highly-active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) in HIV outpatients depending on the daily number of tablets prescribed.

Materials and methods The authors performed a retrospective study in patients who started HAART treatment in 2010. To carry out this study, The authors examined the data recorded in the computerised dispensing record. The compliance was evaluated by the relationship of the no. of doses prescribed/dispensed for each patient. The ARV regimen of each patient was also classified into four groups, depending on the daily number of tablets prescribed: group A: single-tablet regimen; group B: two-tablet regimen; group C: three-tablet regimen; group D: four-tablet regimen.

Results During the period studied, 86 patients started treatment; 13 of them were discarded for various reasons (death, change of treatment, etc.), so finally The authors assessed the compliance in 69 patients whose results are shown in Table 1.

Conclusions The overall percentage adherence to the treatment was really high in the population studied. It exceeded 95% in 86.4% of the cases. Furthermore, this adherence increased when the therapeutic regime was less complex, possibly due to the fact that is easier for the patient to take the medicine as intended. The compliance was measured by only one method, which was to assume that patients who collected drugs took them properly. So The authors consider that further studies must be done using different methods.