We agree that adherence to medication is important and subject to complex influences. We thought that understanding of medication was a neglected factor and set out to study this rather than adherence. We had hoped that this was clear. We were surprised to find that, broadly speaking, patients understood psychotropic and non-psychotropic medication to the same degree. We confirm that patients from ethnic minorities who were able to speak English were included; patients were in acute wards and not long-stay wards (of which we have none). In the example of how we chose which medication to ask about, we do not say that we selected the mood stabiliser over the antipsychotic because it was given first. We chose it because it was likely to be used for the longest time. We agree that our sample was not representative of all older psychiatric patients and say as much in the discussion.