Older Australians are increasingly being forced to return to hospital repeatedly due to the side effects of their medications. The phenomenon has assumed such proportions that up to 10% of hospitalization costs are caused by adverse drug reactions. It is the result of a study by the University of Western Australia, based on 20 years of data on patients aged 60 and over in state hospitals. The study, published in the British Medical Journal, indicates that around 2000, over-60s were more than double the probability of being hospitalized twice or more for adverse reactions to the same drug compared to the beginning of the 1980s. For patients with cancer, kidney disease or diabetes, the likelihood of multiple hospitalizations is about double that of patients with fewer complications. 'Older patients are vulnerable to adverse reactions because of the multiple medicines they are prescribed to manage chronic diseases, and because they metabolize them in different and even variable ways,' said Prof. Min Zhang who led the research. According to the scholar, doctors and pharmacists should be very attentive to the different reactions to drugs, and treatments should be reviewed regularly, since a new and dangerous side effect could occur at any time.
Source: http://www.sanitanews.it/quotidiano/intarticolo.php?id=1975&sendid=454
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