Chronic disease is identified as one of the main causes of all deaths worldwide and adversely affects the economy through huge healthcare costs and human capital losses. These outcomes can be ameliorated if patients and their healthcare providers adhere to the care plans developed for the patients' chronic condition. This paper proposes a framework for adherence support based on (1) continuous monitoring and recognition of possible deviations from plan; (2) determination of the cause of the possible deviation; and (3) generation of an appropriate to assist patients and their healthcare providers avoid plan failure. The framework and findings are generalised to include agents in any domain that adopts similar behaviour monitoring and intervention mechanisms. A cost/benefit analysis is performed under different settings using a number of theoretical and simulation studies. The theoretical analysis serves to: (1) establish the general principles of intervention; and (2) provide a basis for validating the simulation results. The agents are modelled as Belief Desire Intention (BDI) agents and different modes of failure (“deficits”) and interventions are characterised in these terms. The simulation code was shown to produce results compatible with the theoretical analysis and has the potential to be used for other settings and domains for which a theoretical analysis is difficult.