Recognition of adverse drug events in older hospitalized medical patients

Source: European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology Area: Evidence > Medicines Management > References Objective: To assess medical teams' ability to recognize adverse drug events (ADEs) in older inpatients. Methods: The study cohort comprised 250 patients aged 65 years or older consecutively admitted to internal medicine wards of three hospitals in the Netherlands between Apr and Nov 2007.  An independent expert team identified ADEs present upon admission or occurring during hospitalisation by a structured retrospective patient chart review.  For all ADEs identified, the expert team assessed causality, severity, preventability and recognition by medical teams. Results: The medical teams did not recognise 19.9% of all ADEs present upon admission {60.4 ADEs (95% CI, 51.5 to 70.8) per 100 hospitalisations} and 20.3% of all ADEs occurring during the hospital stay (47.2 ADEs (95% CI, 39.4 to 56.5) per 100 hospitalisations).  Unrecognised ADEs were significantly more often ADEs with possible causality (p = 0.014, df = 1), ADEs caused by medication errors (p less than ...
Source: NeLM - Care of Older People - Category: Geriatrics Source Type: news