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[Medical treatment of the elderly in residential care: a multicenter cross-sectional study]
Francis Fauvelle1, Fariba Kabirian2, Aurélie Bernard3
1Service Pharmacie, Groupe hospitalier Le Raincy-Montfermeil, Montfermeil, France.
Objective:
To retrospectively assess the quality of prescriptions in elderly patients prior the distribution of guidelines for geriatric drug prescriptions.
Methods:
A cross-sectional study was conducted for one day in 2012 to investigate the quality of the prescriptions in 495 residents of 8 nursing homes. A 6 items-quality score was calculated, ranging from 0 (lowest quality) to 6 (highest quality).
Results:
The median number of prescribed drugs was 8,5 per resident. Over a total of 4311 prescribed drugs, the average quality score was 4,96 ± 0,45; 4,54 ± 0,70 in computerized orders and 3,4 ± 1,02 in handwritten orders. Among 939 drugs considered as at high risk of inducing serious adverse reactions, monitoring was prescribed 154 times only (16,4%).
Conclusions:
A lack of drug monitoring was highlighted, especially for high risk drugs. The quality of prescription may be improved by the use of computerized orders.
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