Observational studyInternal and emergency medicine2017
Is polypharmacy an independent risk factor for adverse outcomes after an emergency department visit?
Observational study in Internal and emergency medicine, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 25 papers.
What it found
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The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
25 citing papers in PubMed.
- Polypharmacy in Older Adults: A Narrative Review of Clinical Risks, Deprescribing Strategies, and Interdisciplinary Management.Geriatrics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Deprescribing: Reducing Harm, Enhancing Care.Rambam Maimonides medical journal · 2026Review
- Review
- Point-Prevalence of Antimicrobial-Related Potential Drug-Drug Interactions in Hospitalized Older Adults: A Multicenter Study Using Lexicomp.Journal of clinical medicine · 2026Article
- Patients' Needs and Expectations for the Application of Prevention of Drug-related Problems Prevention Programs.Journal of research in pharmacy practice · 2026Article
- Food Supplements and Their Use in Elderly Subjects-Challenges and Risks in Selected Health Issues: A Narrative Review.Foods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- Influence of Potentially Inappropriate Medication Use on Older Australians' Admission to Emergency Department Short Stay.Geriatrics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- The association between continuous polypharmacy and hospitalization, emergency department visits, and death in older adults: a nationwide large cohort study.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2024Article
- Short-term prognosis of polypharmacy in elderly patients treated in emergency departments: results from the EDEN project.Therapeutic advances in drug safety · 2024Article
- Clin-STAR corner: Practice changing advances in prescribing for geriatric emergency department patients.Journal of the American Geriatrics Society · 2023Article
- Effectiveness of countermeasure for polypharmacy by multidisciplinary team review in patients with diabetes mellitus.Journal of diabetes investigation · 2023Observational
- Potentially inappropriate medication use as predictors of hospitalization for residents in nursing home.BMC geriatrics · 2023Article
- Factors associated with polypharmacy and the high risk of medication-related problems among older community-dwelling adults in European countries: a longitudinal study.BMC geriatrics · 2022Article
- Transitional care interventions to reduce emergency department visits in older adults: A systematic review.Belitung nursing journal · 2022Review
- Improving the prognostic value of multimorbidity through the integration of selected biomarkers to the comprehensive geriatric assessment: An observational retrospective monocentric study.Frontiers in medicine · 2022Article
- Polypharmacy in older adults: a narrative review of definitions, epidemiology and consequences.European geriatric medicine · 2021Review
- An overview of prevalence, determinants and health outcomes of polypharmacy.Therapeutic advances in drug safety · 2020Review
- Understanding adverse drug-related emergency department visits: development of a conceptual model through a systematic review.Therapeutic advances in drug safety · 2019Review
- Emergency department visits of older adults within 30 days of discharge: analysis from the pharmacotherapy perspective.Einstein (Sao Paulo, Brazil) · 2019Article
- Processing of Electronic Medical Records for Health Services Research in an Academic Medical Center: Methods and Validation.JMIR medical informatics · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
This study aimed at verifying the role of polypharmacy as an independent risk factor for adverse health outcomes in older emergency department (ED) patients. This was a large (n = 2057) sample of older ED patients (≥65 years) participating in an observational cohort study. Polypharmacy and excessive polypharmacy were defined as having 6-9 drug prescriptions and 10 or more drug prescriptions in the last 3 months, respectively. The total number of medication prescriptions was also available. Outcome measures were in-hospital mortality; 30-day ED return; ED revisit, hospital admission, and mortality at 6 months. Logistic and Cox regression models as well as receiver operating characteristic curves using the Youden index and the area under the curve were calculated. Polypharmacy and excessive polypharmacy were present in 624 (30.3 %) and 367 (17.8 %) subjects, respectively. The mean number of prescriptions in the last 3 months was 5.7 (range 0-25) drugs. Polypharmacy and, particularly, excessive polypharmacy were constantly and independently associated with worse outcomes. A cut-off of 6 had the highest value of the Youden Index in predicting the majority of the adverse outcomes considered. Polypharmacy and excessive polypharmacy are independent risk factors for adverse health outcomes after an ED visit. Further studies are needed to clarify whether drug related issues (such as non-compliance, inappropriate or suboptimal prescribing, adverse drug reactions, and drug-drug or drug-disease interactions) or underlying multimorbidity and disease severity, as well as clinical complexity and frailty, are responsible for the negative outcomes associated with polypharmacy.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.