1. Home Medication Regimens Increase in Complexity After Admission for Fall in the Older Trauma Patient.
- Author
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Stanley SP, DeMario BS, Beel KT, Lee MS, Petitt JC, Brown LR, Tseng ES, and Ho VP
- Subjects
- Humans, Aged, Middle Aged, Retrospective Studies, Analgesics, Opioid therapeutic use, Hospitalization, Polypharmacy, Patient Discharge, Aftercare
- Abstract
Background: Hospitalization for the older trauma patient is an opportunity to assess polypharmacy. We hypothesized that medication regimen complexity (RxCS) and pain medication prescriptions (PRxs) would increase in older home-going patients admitted for a fall., Methods: We retrospectively chart reviewed patients ≥45 years old admitted for a fall at a level 1 trauma center who were discharged home with full medication documentation. RxCS was compared pre-admission and post-discharge with Wilcoxon signed-rank tests; opioid and non-opioid PRxs were compared with Fisher's exact test, α = .05., Results: 103 patients met inclusion criteria; 58% were ≥65 years old. RxCS (9 [.5-13] to 11 [4.5-15], P < .01) increased on discharge. Opioid PRx rates increased significantly in all age groups. Non-opioid PRx rates increased significantly for patients <65 but not for patients ≥65., Conclusions: Admission for a fall was associated with increases in RxCS, while PRx changes were age-dependent. Providers should recognize that admissions for older patients who fall after trauma are underutilized opportunities to address polypharmacy in high-risk patients., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting InterestsThe author(s) declared the following potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Dr Ho spouse is a consultant for Medtronic, Zimmer Biomet, Atricure, and Astra Zeneca. The remaining authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
- Published
- 2023
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