Assessment for the Risk Factors of Polypharmacy in Elderly Patients

Abstract

Polypharmacy is typical clinical issue in elderly people, it includes prescribed medications, over-the-counter
(OTC) and herbal preparations.
A total of 173 Iraqi elderly patients of age 60 years and above, were enrolled in this study. Data were
collected using structured, cross-sectional questionnaire-based survey. List of required data were recorded
by interviewing patients during admission to Baghdad teaching hospital, Al-Yarmouk teaching hospital and
3 community pharmacies in Baghdad governorate. From August - September 2019 in Baghdad-Iraq. Data
were analyzed using SPSS software (version 25). Relationships between daily drug consumptions (DDC) and
other continuous variables were examined using spearmen’s correlation. For between-group comparisons
of daily drug consumptions, Student’s t-tests were performed. For categorical variables with more than 2
categories, multi-factor ANOVA (Analysis of variance) was performed.
Significant number of the older Iraqi patient population has a high prevalence of polypharmacy with a high
prevalence of consumption of lipid modifying drugs, proton pump inhibitor, oral antidiabetic drugs, and
angiotensin II receptor antagonist. according to this study. The findings of this study showed that the higher
DDC was significantly associated with hypertension alongside higher number of comorbidities, ADRs and
PIM. Intraclass polypharmacy was highly associated with anti-hypertensives and lipid modifying drugs,
suggesting revision of the drug-dispensing policy among older Iraqi population.