Browsing by Subject "antikolinergit"
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(2009)Anticholinergic medicines are commonly used to treat e.g. incontinence. These medicines have side effects, which may cause and also exacerbate e.g. dryness of the mouth, increased heart rate, and even cognitive impairment. Older people may be more at risk for these side effects as they may be experiencing similar symptoms as a natural effect of aging, and because they may be using several medicines causing these effects. Older people often have a high medicine burden and also a high disease burden. Measuring anticholinergic effects to change medicine regimens and to reduce the symptoms is difficult as there is no golden standard method. This thesis investigated the published methods available for estimating anticholinergic burden in the literature review part, and used one anticholinergic scoring system, the Anticholinergic Risk Scale, in a cross-sectional study to test the effects of anticholinergics on mortality in 1004 older institutionalised patients from Helsinki area public hospitals. Cross-tabulations and Kruskal-Wallis or Chi square methods were used to detect differences between variables such as nutritional status or certain diagnoses when the patients were stratified according to their anticholinergic use. Cox Proportional Hazard regression, the logrank test and Kaplan-Meier curve were used to investigate the effects of anticholinergics on 5-year all-cause mortality. An in vitro serum assay and seven anticholinergic scoring systems were identified in the literature search. Also, 17 anticholinergic lists were identified, which covered 278 medicines, of which 21 appeared on at least eight of the lists. In the empirical study, the women's (n = 745) mean (± SD) age was 83.35 (± 9.99) years, and they were older than the men (n = 241, mean age ± SD 75.11 ± 11.48, p < 0.001). The 1004 patients (response rate 70 %) were using a mean (± SD) number of 7.1 ± 3.4 regular medicines (range 0-20). 455 patients used no anticholinergics, 363 had some anticholinergic burden (score 1 or 2), and 186 had a high burden, with anticholinergic scores of 3 or more. The mean ARS score (± SD) was 1.2 ± 1.5 (range 0-10). When three anticholinergic lists were compared, all three lists identified only 280/791 of patients who were anticholinergic users according to at least one list. No association was found between anticholinergic medicine use and mortality. There are several methods available for measuring anticholinergic burden, but there is a need for a consensus method. This was highlighted by the lack of agreement on medicines on different lists and when three anticholinergic lists tested identified different patients when compared to each other. Anticholinergic use was common in this frail, older patient sample, but no effect on mortality was shown in this study setting. The cross-sectional nature of the data limits the reliability of the study, and any conclusions beyond older patients in Helsinki area must be done very cautiously. Future research should define anticholinergics better and investigate their possible effect on mortality in a prospective, randomised, and controlled setting.
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(2013)Harmful drug effects are common among older medicine users. Potentially harmful drugs for older people have been defined by different criteria. Potentially inappropriate medications (PIMs) defined by Beers criteria have been associated with adverse effects, increased costs, need of hospital care and disabilities. Drugs with anticholinergic properties (DAPs) are associated with anticholinergic side effects, cognitive decline and delirium. Psychotropic drugs have been associated with increased risk of falls and mortality. Concurrent use (≥3) of psychotropic drugs has been considered harmful for older people by the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare. The aim of this study was to examine the prevalence of potentially harmful drug (PHD) use (DAPs, PIMs, or concurrent use of ≥3 psychotropic drugs) and the accumulation of PHDs in aged people living in nursing homes and assisted living facilities. The objective was also to investigate which patient characteristics are associated with PHD use or accumulation of these drugs. The cross-sectional data was collected in 2011-2012 as a part of a larger study "Reducing inappropriate, anticholinergic and psychotropic drug use among older residents in institutional care". The study population (N=326) consisted of ≥ 65-aged residents living in nursing homes or assisted living facilities in Helsinki (n=227) and Kouvola (n=99). The mean age was 83.5 years, 70.0 % were women and mean Charlson comorbidity index was 2.6. Residents were divided into four groups: aged using 1) DAPs, 2) PIMs defined by Beers criteria, 3) concurrent use of ≥3 psychotropic drugs and 4) no PHDs in use. Both those fulfilling any of these criteria and those fulfilling all the three criteria (accumulation of PHD) are described. Users in these groups were compared to the non-users. A majority of the residents, 78,8 % (95 % CI: 74,4 - 83,3) used ≥1 PHDs: 67,8 % (95 % CI: 62,7- 72,9) used ≥1 DAPs, 32,2 % (95 % CI: 27,1- 37,3) ≥1 PIMs and 32,2 % (95 % CI: 27,1-37,3) used ≥3 psychotropics concurrently. Of the residents, 41 (12.6 %) had a medication treatment that fulfilled all the three criteria of PHD use. These residents used significantly more PHDs than others (average mean 4,8 [range 3-7] vs. 1,6 [range 0-6]). The residents having the PHD accumulation were more often males and used more drugs than others. There were no statistical differences among the other characteristics of these groups. The most common PHDs were mirtazapine (n=66), lorazepam (n=64), oxazepam (n=62), ketiapine (n=58) and stimulant laxatives without opioids (n=58). Use of DAPs was associated with multimorbidity, use of PIMs with weaker health related quality of life, and use of psychotropics with younger age. High number of drugs was associated with all these criteria. Use and accumulation of potentially harmful drugs is common among the aged living in nursing homes and assisted living facilities. New means are needed to optimize drug treatments and to educate professionals taking care of these patients. Special attention should be paid on the use of antipsychotics, benzodiazepines, mirtazapine and stimulant laxatives.
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