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What is Adjunctive Therapy?

Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen

Adjunct can mean to "join together" or to "combine," and adjunctive therapy is an additional or secondary therapy combined with a primary treatment that increases effectiveness in treating a condition. Medical practitioners use this therapy frequently to get better cure rates or a faster response to primary treatment. It can take many different forms. Some adjunct therapy involves using more than one medicine to treat something. Other times, several different treatment strategies or types or care are employed simultaneously.

When it comes to drug adjunctive therapy, there are numerous available examples. Often, people will be on a primary asthma medication that isn’t fully controlling their symptoms. In these instances, doctors could consider prescribing a second medication to better treatment symptoms, like combining the use of a fast acting inhaler with a steroid inhaler. A few companies even combine two medicines in single inhalers that have been shown to be more effective together than alone.

Adjunct therapy may involve using more than one medicine to treat a condition.
Adjunct therapy may involve using more than one medicine to treat a condition.

In certain instances, a second medicine doesn’t treat the primary condition but actually makes the first medicine work more effectively. Some antibiotics work in this manner and a resistant infection might be treated with two types of antibiotics at once, each contributing to the efficiency of the other. A few mood stabilizing drugs work in a similar way, where the use of a second as a combined therapy actually increases the efficacy of the first, possibly raising its blood concentration level or making it easier to absorb.

Adjunctive therapy is very common in the treatment of mental illness.
Adjunctive therapy is very common in the treatment of mental illness.

Another way in which drug combination therapy may be employed is to minimize side effects of a primary therapy. Some medicines cause uncomfortable or dangerous side effects. By co-administering another agent, doctors may be able to reduce these problems.

There are many times when a person requires more than one type of therapy to treat a condition. A stroke victim needs the primary care of medical treatment and vigilance, but if brain damage has occurred, adjunctive therapy in other forms needs to begin soon after the stroke. Speech, occupational, or physical therapy could be adjunct to primary medical care, and its role is to help provide greater healing and opportunity to recover function. Many people who have been injured have some form of physical therapy as adjunct to the care received by physicians.

Eye glasses may be adjunct with eye exercises to improve sight problems.
Eye glasses may be adjunct with eye exercises to improve sight problems.

Adjunctive therapy is also very common in the treatment of any mental illnesses. In addition to drug treatment, which can help reduce symptoms, psychotherapy is frequently used. In fact, it’s been repeatedly shown that people with serious mental illness benefit best by a model that includes both medications and psychotherapy. There is a greater likelihood of the person reaching recovery and remaining stable.

Radiation treatment may be adjunct with surgery for cancer patients.
Radiation treatment may be adjunct with surgery for cancer patients.

Many other examples exist of adjunctive therapy. Cancer patients might have surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatment. Diabetics could get nutritional counseling. People with sight problems might get eyeglasses and do eye exercises. Such examples are only a very few of the many ways that medicine combines therapies for better care.

Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen

Tricia has a Literature degree from Sonoma State University and has been a frequent TheHealthBoard contributor for many years. She is especially passionate about reading and writing, although her other interests include medicine, art, film, history, politics, ethics, and religion. Tricia lives in Northern California and is currently working on her first novel.

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Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen

Tricia has a Literature degree from Sonoma State University and has been a frequent TheHealthBoard contributor for many years. She is especially passionate about reading and writing, although her other interests include medicine, art, film, history, politics, ethics, and religion. Tricia lives in Northern California and is currently working on her first novel.

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Discussion Comments

Certlerant

Adjunctive therapy is widely used for those with heart conditions.

Most of the time, heart disease stems from a variety of factors, including high blood pressure, high cholesterol and obesity, to name a few.

As a result, several medications are prescribed in an effort to address each symptom and decrease the risk for heart attack of stroke.

Heart patients are usually prescribed a blood thinner to reduce the risk of clogged arteries, cholesterol medication and blood pressure medication.

Also, heart patients receive nutrition and fitness advice.

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    • Adjunct therapy may involve using more than one medicine to treat a condition.
      By: Scott Griessel
      Adjunct therapy may involve using more than one medicine to treat a condition.
    • Adjunctive therapy is very common in the treatment of mental illness.
      By: alexsokolov
      Adjunctive therapy is very common in the treatment of mental illness.
    • Eye glasses may be adjunct with eye exercises to improve sight problems.
      By: jamstockfoto
      Eye glasses may be adjunct with eye exercises to improve sight problems.
    • Radiation treatment may be adjunct with surgery for cancer patients.
      By: jovannig
      Radiation treatment may be adjunct with surgery for cancer patients.
    • People who have been injured may have some form of physical therapy as adjunct to the care received by physicians.
      By: Monkey Business
      People who have been injured may have some form of physical therapy as adjunct to the care received by physicians.
    • Occupational therapy may be adjunct to primary medical care.
      By: iceteastock
      Occupational therapy may be adjunct to primary medical care.
    • Occupational therapy is often used in combination with other types of adjunctive therapies.
      By: g215
      Occupational therapy is often used in combination with other types of adjunctive therapies.