Authors

1Begoña Pellicer García, 1Raúl Juárez Vela, 1David Delgado Sevilla, 1Luis Carlos Redondo Castán, 1Isabel Antón, 1Sandra Guerrero Portillo

Position

¹Enfermero/a. Facultad de Ciencias de la Salud. Universidad San Jorge (Zaragoza).

Contact email: bpellicer@usj.es

Abstract

Purpose: To study the prevalence of drug intake and falls in institutionalized non-handicapped elderly people.
Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional or prevalence study, using a simple randomized sampling method. The following validated tools were used: MEC-35 (1979) and WHO's questionnaire (1989) to study falls in elderly people.
Results: Many participants (43.14%) were receiving daily doses of four to seven drugs, and 31.37% were taking eight or more drugs.
Overall, 21 falls had occurred in the last 12 months since the start of the study, in 51 participants, with prevalence rate being 41.17%.
A majority of participants (52.94%) were receiving sedatives; use of sedatives was high, especially in individuals older than 75-79 years. In most falls a sedative drug use intake could be found (76.19% of falls, for both sexes). Our findings show a strong correlation between sedative drugs use and probability of falls.
Conclusions: Polypharmacy is a common finding in our geriatric population.
A high drug intake is closely correlated with falls in the elderly. Primary care teams are mainly responsible for drug prescription and assess adverse effects versus clinical benefits from drug use. As a consequence, health care providers should be aware of the need for right and careful prescribing. A holistic evaluation of the patients is clearly needed. This will allow us to achieve a reduced prevalence of falls due to polypharmacy in the elderly and to improve health care for our patients.

Keywords:

elderly; Falls; polypharmacy

Versión en Español

Título:

Prevalencia de la ingesta de fármacos y caídas en una residencia geriátrica del sector II de Zaragoza