Nina Barnett

TL;DR: Elderly people are the largest consumers of prescription and OTC medicines and are more vulnerable to drug adverse effects and the risks of multiple or inappropriate medications, and governments, regulatory bodies, professionals and the drug industry have a responsibility to ensure that robust systems are in place if the increased use of OTC medicine by elderly people is to be safe and effective.

TL;DR: The patient-centred approach is designed to assist with collaborative (patient and clinician based) medication review to inform decisions around deprescribing and address polypharmacy as part of overall strategies to optimise medicines for the patient.

TL;DR: A ‘bottom-up’ educational approach should be given to provide early experience of and change the culture around medication review, to include the education of undergraduate and foundation doctors and pharmacists.

TL;DR: This commentary re-visits the call for adherence interventions to be tailored to meet individual need, by considering what this means for day-to-day practice and how this can be achieved, and provides an update on advances in psychological theory to identify the root cause of an individual’s non-adherence.

TL;DR: Older people in the UK receive a disproportionate amount of medication and drugs which should be used with particular care or even avoided in older people include benzodiazepines, warfarin, digoxin, aminoglycosides, tricylic antidepressants, antipsychotics and long-acting oral hypoglycaemic agents.