Prescribing Drugs for an Aging Population: Polypharmacy (Multiple Medications) and the Health of the Elderly

The geriatric population is prescribed the highest proportion of medications in relation to their percentage of the U.S population-13% of current geriatric population purchase 33% of all prescription drugs and this number will increase to 50% by 2040. Prevalence of both adverse drug reactions and treatment failures increase in the older patients. Adverse Drug Events (ADEs) are responsible for 5-28% of acute geriatric medical admissions. It has been estimated that for every one dollar we spend on medications at nursing home facilities, we spend $1.33 in health care resources for the treatment of drug related morbidity and mortality. In this review we will talk about the drug mechanism, why some people are able to tolerate some medications and why some others not, what we can do to change the nature of practice of medicine in the future and how we can provide more safety for us when we age.

Speaker: Mehrdad Ayati, MD, Stanford Medical Center