Ege Tıp Dergisi

Öz

Life expectancy is increasing all over the world, as well as in our country. Since the birth rate is decreasing, the population of elderly is relatively increasing. The more increase in the elderly population, the more increase in illnesses typically observed in this age group. Therefore, the more use of health services by elderly people, the higher expenditure on health services. For several reasons, elderly people are faced to a high risk of drug-related problems during treatment. The factors that complicate the treatment of elderly patients are age-related pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic changes, polypharmacy, comorbidity and geriatric syndromes. Additionally, inappropriate use of drugs in elderly patients is a common and important problem. Irrationale use of drugs include those unsuitable for elderly patients, those of little benefit and those with possible harmful effects. In this regard, with the aid of previously determined criteria and avoiding the use of both inappropriate and high risk drugs, polypharmacy, drug-drug interactions and adverse drug reactions could be detected and prevented. It should be noted that this would be a significant contribution to the effective and safe treatment of elderly patients.