Statistics

  1. For every dollar Medicare spends on NH medications it spends $1.33 addressing medication induced problems Elderly Americans (ages 65 and over) account for the purchase of 30 percent of all prescriptions and 40 percent of over-the-counter drugs.
  2. Age-related changes in elderly patients allow drugs to maintain their effects longer, have unusual or unexpected actions, and cause more bad reactions with serious and life-threatening outcomes.
  3. A large study of patients 65 and older found that 20% filled at least 1 prescription for an inappropriate medicine.
  4. In a given year, well over 175,000 people in the U.S., aged 65 or older, will visit an emergency room due to an adverse reaction to commonly prescribed medication. Warfarin (Coumadin), insulin, aspirin, clopidogrel (Plavix) and digoxin are common offenders.
  5. The average nursing home patient receives 4 to 7 different medications daily.
  6. Fifty-one percent of drugs have label changes due to major safety issues discovered after marketing.
  7. Four percent of approved drugs are ultimately withdrawn from the market for safety reasons.
  8. Prescription-related drug problems result in about 119,000 annual U.S. deaths.
    • That is if the death is counted as a medication caused death, many deaths are listed as organ failure
      (like kidney failure) but much of the incidence of organ failure is drug induced!
  9. Twenty-eight percent of hospitalized patients experience adverse drug events annually, thus occurring in 8.8 million hospitalizations each year.
  10. Tens of thousands of fatalities in hospitalized patients in the U.S. occur annually due to drugs.
  11. One in 4 people ages 65 and older receive at least 1 of 20 drugs that are potentially inappropriate for elderly patients.
  12. Thirty percent of elderly patients use 8 or more prescription drugs daily, and the elderly population takes an average of 18 prescription drugs per year. It is estimated that 10 to 30 percent of hospital admissions among the elderly are related to drug problems.
  13. If polypharmacy where a disease, it would rank 6th behind diabetes but ahead of osteoarthritis in terms of costs of diseases effecting persons over 65 years of age, yet Medicare reimburses for 30 minute diabetic consults in primary care but not sufficiently for even a 10 minute overall medication consult.
  14. 2,216,000 hospitalized patients/year experience serious ADR.
  15. From 2000-2008 the percent of Americans who use at least 1 prescription drug in the past month increased from 44% to 48%, 2 prescription drugs increased from 25% to 31%, 5 prescription drugs increased from 6% to 11%.
  16. ADRs rank as 4-6th leading cause of death (95% CI): Ranking after heart disease, cancer, stroke, (pulmonary disease and accidents) ahead of diabetes and pneumonia.
  17. Recently science has demonstrated that each additional unit of anticholinergic and sedative drug burden has a negative effect on physical function (health ABC score) similar to that of 3 additional physical co morbidities and a greater effect than anxiety, depression or cognitive impairment. *This item has not made the translation from the scientific world to clinical practice.
  18. Recently science has demonstrated that each additional unit of anticholinergic and sedative drug burden had a negative effect on cognitive task performance (DSST score) Similar to that of 4 additional physical co morbidities and half the effect of anxiety, depression or cognitive impairment. *This item has not made the translation from the scientific world to clinical practice.