New research indicates that harm from medicines is common in older adults following hospital discharge, and it results in substantial use of healthcare resources. In the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology study, medication-related harm affected 1 in 3 older adults following hospital discharge, of which 50 percent was potentially preventable.
In the study of 1280 older adults from 5 teaching hospitals in Southern England, failure to take medications properly was implicated in one-quarter of cases of medication harm. The cost to the NHS of post-discharge medication harm in older adults was estimated at £396 million, of which over 90 percent was attributable to hospital readmissions.
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