ArticleTropical medicine and health2022
Global prevalence of polypharmacy among the COVID-19 patients: a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis of observational studies.
Article in Tropical medicine and health, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
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Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 27 citations in OpenAlex.
- A machine learning model exploring the relationship between chronic medication and COVID-19 clinical outcomes.International journal of clinical pharmacy · 2025Article
- Short and long-term outcomes of children and adolescents hospitalized with COVID-19 or influenza: results of the AUTCOV study.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- COVID-19 Pandemic Waves and 2024-2025 Winter Season in Relation to Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme Inhibitors, Angiotensin Receptor Blockers and Amantadine.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Polypharmacy or potentially inappropriate medications among older adults with COVID-19 in a secondary hospital in China and their association with mortality.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Short- and long-term outcomes following COVID-19 or Influenza hospitalization in adults: results of the AUTCOV study.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Baseline medication load and long-term outcomes in COVID-19-hospitalized patients: results of the AUTCOVSTUDY.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- COVID-19 in Relation to Chronic Antihistamine Prescription.Microorganisms · 2024Article
- Polypharmacy in Older Patients: A Three-Year Longitudinal Analysis in Primary Care Settings of Aragón, Spain.Annals of geriatric medicine and research · 2024Article
- Safety Aspects of Herb Interactions: Current Understanding and Future Prospects.Current drug metabolism · 2024Review
- Article
- Correlates of poor clinical outcomes related to COVID-19 among older people with psychiatric illness - a mixed methods study.International journal of psychiatry in medicine · 2023Article
- Prevalence of Potentially Inappropriate Prescriptions According to the New STOPP/START Criteria in Nursing Homes: A Systematic Review.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- Polypharmacy and potentially inappropriate medications among hospitalized older adults with COVID-19 in Malaysian tertiary hospitals.Journal of pharmaceutical policy and practice · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundPolypharmacy has traditionally been defined in various texts as the use of 5 or more chronic drugs, the use of inappropriate drugs, or drugs that are not clinically authorized. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of polypharmacy among the COVID-19 patients, and the side effects, by systematic review and meta-analysis.
methodsThis study was performed by systematic review method and in accordance with PRISMA 2020 criteria. The protocol in this work is registered in PROSPERO (CRD42021281552). Particular databases and repositories have been searched to identify and select relevant studies. The quality of articles was assessed based on the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale checklist. Heterogeneity of the studies was measured using the I
resultsThe results of meta-analysis showed that the prevalence of polypharmacy in 14 studies with a sample size of 189,870 patients with COVID-19 is 34.6% (95% CI: 29.6-40). Studies have shown that polypharmacy is associated with side effects, increased morbidity and mortality among patients with COVID-19. The results of meta-regression analysis reported that with increasing age of COVID-19 patients, the prevalence of polypharmacy increases (p < 0.05). DISCUSSION: The most important strength of this study is the updated search to June 2022 and the use of all databases to increase the accuracy and sensitivity of the study. The most important limitation of this study is the lack of proper definition of polypharmacy in some studies and not mentioning the number of drugs used for patients in these studies.
conclusionPolypharmacy is seen in many patients with COVID-19. Since there is no definitive cure for COVID-19, the multiplicity of drugs used to treat this disease can affect the severity of the disease and its side effects as a result of drug interactions. This highlights the importance of controlling and managing prescription drugs for patients with COVID-19.
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