More than one-third of Australians over 70 take five or more medications regularly, and while this is appropriate in many cases, a study out of Deakin University has revealed the potential harm caused by taking unnecessary medications.
According to Dr. Alemayehu Mekonnen, an Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Deakin University’s Institute for Health Transformation (IHT), medication-related harm is a leading cause of injury throughout the world, and much of it is preventable.
“Our recent study found that approximately two-thirds of older Australians were taking at least one medication that was unnecessary, or deemed to have an unclear indication when they were discharged from the general medicine wards of a tertiary care health service,” Mekonnen said in a Deakin University release on Friday….