Update on Medication Use Quality and Safety in Older Adults, 2017

Improving the quality of medication use and medication safety in older adults is an important public health priority and is of paramount importance for clinicians who care for them. We selected four important articles from 2017 that address these issues to annotate and critique, and we discuss the b...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of the American Geriatrics Society (JAGS) 2018-12, Vol.66 (12), p.2254-2258
Main Authors: Gray, Shelly L., Marcum, Zachary A., Schmader, Kenneth E., Hanlon, Joseph T.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
adverse drug events
Aged
Antiepileptic agents
British Columbia
Central nervous system
Deprescriptions
Drug Prescriptions
Drug-Related Side Effects and Adverse Reactions - etiology
drug‐related problems
Epilepsy
Hospitalization - statistics & numerical data
Humans
inappropriate prescribing
Inappropriate Prescribing - adverse effects
Inappropriate Prescribing - trends
Medication Adherence - ethnology
Medication Adherence - statistics & numerical data
Older people
Patient Safety
Polypharmacy
Public health
Safety
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Summary:Improving the quality of medication use and medication safety in older adults is an important public health priority and is of paramount importance for clinicians who care for them. We selected four important articles from 2017 that address these issues to annotate and critique, and we discuss the broader implications for optimizing medication use. A longer list of articles is given in an online appendix. The first study provides national data on the prevalence of central nervous system–active medication polypharmacy in older adults and how this has changed over a 9‐year period (2004–2013). The second study characterizes prevalence of and factors associated with nonadherence to antiepileptic drugs in 36,912 older adults with epilepsy, with an emphasis on minorities. The third study describes the extent of antibiotic use in residents of 381 long‐term care facilities (LTCF) in British Columbia, Canada, from 2007 to 2014. Finally, we discuss a meta‐analysis of 42 studies that evaluated the prevalence of hospital admissions caused by adverse drug reactions in older adults. This article is intended to provide a narrative review of important publications on medication use quality and safety for clinicians and researchers committed to optimizing medication use in older adults. J Am Geriatr Soc 66:2254–2258, 2018.
ISSN:0002-8614
1532-5415
DOI:10.1111/jgs.15665