Problems of geriatric pharmacotherapy
Thaler, H.
Acta Medica Croatica Casopis Hravatske Akademije Medicinskih Znanosti 46(2): 125-129
1992
ISSN/ISBN: 1330-0164 PMID: 1384835 Document Number: 388779
No one dies of old age by itself; death is always due to a disease of some kind. This means that safe and effective therapy for old people is a matter of great practical importance. From what has been said above it will be obvious that the effects of drugs in old people are similar to their effects in the young, but there may be differences in degree in their susceptibility to adverse reactions. The existing data are by no means abundant, sometimes contradictory and of limited evidential value. Looking at the picture as a whole, one cannot but agree with those authors who state that the available results are insufficient to substantiate the general opinion that old age in itself heightens the risk of all forms of pharmacotherapy. From the practical point of view it is nowadays essential that no drug should be prescribed for an elderly patient without strict scrutiny of the need for it, that such drugs should not be administered for any longer than is absolutely necessary, that treatment should normally be started with smaller doses than those usually given to younger adults and, lastly, that surveillance for possible side effects should be particularly close. The author states that it must not be forgotten that geriatric patients frequently consult specialists in addition to their family doctors and that they are perhaps overinclined to listen to advice on drug treatment from those about them. One of the duties of the family doctor is to check the assortment of drugs which his patient is consuming--often an alarming total--and to cut down their number to those which are really necessary.