Review article

Prescribing drugs in older people

Daniela Germin Petrović ; Center for dialysis, Istrian health care centers, Umag, Croatia
Vera Vlahović-Palčevski ; Department of clinical pharmacology, Clinical department of clinical microbiology, Clinical hospital center Rijeka, Croatia

Abstract

Medication prescribing is one of the key components of the health care in the elderly.
Elderly persons are more susceptible to the effects of various drugs due to age related
physiological changes. Inappropriate prescribing to the elderly is highly prevalent and is associated
with an increased risk of adverse drug events, morbidity, mortality and health care
costs. Drug treatment of different co-morbid states and polypharmacy are main risk factors
for adverse drug events in the elderly. Inappropriate prescribing may be detected by using
different explicit or implicit tools. The most widely used tools are Beers’ criteria, Improved
Prescribing in the Elderly Tool (IPET), Screening Tool of Older Persons’ Potentially Inappropriate
Prescriptions (STOP), Medication Appropriateness Index (MAE) and Naranjo criteria.
Clinical application of these criteria may be an efficient method to improve and optimize
drug prescribing in the elderly leading to decreasing the incidence of adverse drug events.

Keywords

adverse drug events; Beers’ criteria; elderly; inappropriate prescribing; polypharmacy

Hrčak ID:

66074

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/66074

Publication date:

7.3.2011.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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