Drug Challenges When Dealing Older Patients Essay

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Geriatric Pharmacotherapy and Medication Challenges

Prescription Problems in Elderly Patients

In elderly patients, prescriptions, over the counter (OTC), and herbals may cause problems because they suffer from several chronic disorders resulting in the excessive use of drugs compared to any other age group. It can be understood by the diminished physiological reverse, which is mostly associated with aging and can further be depleted by the chronic or acute state of diseases and drug effects. OTCs like sedatives among the elderly patients are said to cause an increase in the number of falls. These are the major concerns for the older adults because the use of multiple medications increases the risk of drug-drug counteractions and other adverse effects (Adams & Urban, 2016).

Major Physiological Changes of Aging

Pharmacokinetic changes

· Renal functioning experiences potential decrease

· Hepatic drug metabolism is also affected by aging.

Pharmacodynamics changes

· Older patients become more sensitive to effects of medications

· Some elderly patients may demonstrate decreased responses to certain medications and their adrenergic system.

Hypoglycemia unawareness

· The response of an elderly’s central nervous system decreases resulting in decreased neural density.

· The sensory, motor and autonomic fibers of an older adult are lost.

· Aging results in the decrease of tonic parasympathetic outflow while their sympathetic tone will increase.

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Pros and Cons of Beers Criteria

A Beers criterion is a well-established method that provides the status of every drug being used by an elderly patient and categorizes them as either appropriate or inappropriate for given conditions. Therefore, the method is useful when evaluating the appropriateness of prescribing. The other advantage of Beers Criteria is that it gives information of each drug formulation that has been prescribed to elderly patients as it assesses its appropriateness. In geriatric patients, Beers criterion is a method used in evaluating the rationality of prescriptions. The con of this criterion is that it consumes much time (Adams & Urban, 2016).

Beers Criteria is an Evidence-based Medicine (EBM). The excessively rigid application of clinical guidelines and evidence in patient care has resulted in ‘cookbook medicine’ practice. Moreover, the clinical practice applied by Beers Criteria may be appropriate resulting in the suboptimal care given to patients. In the process, encountering inappropriate care that leads to harming some patients. Furthermore, part of physicians will become discouraged and eventually lead to the downgrading of good clinicians regarding their reasoning capacity and judgment (Adams & Urban, 2016).

Age-Related Physiological Changes on Drug Response in Older Adults….....

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