Home Medication Regimens Increase in Complexity After Admission for Fall in the Older Trauma Patient

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.

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.

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.

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.