We are also looking forward to live longer life so as to reach such a position of with countless number of hope and dreams, whilst it is hard and complicated time to live in no matter how richer and/or influencers we became.
Just because an older person is prescribed a medicine it doesn’t mean they will take it. In fact, the evidence suggests that the more medicines someone is supposed to take the harder they find it to manage.
As a result people often end up taking fewer than if they had had a smaller and more manageable number to begin with.
The mere fact of having to take large numbers of medicines can reduce quality of life and cause anxiety and confusion or mean they stop taking their medicines altogether.
Older people may also face practical problems with their medications; like finding the containers hard to open, having difficulty swallowing or losing track of what they have taken.
Whether an older person is unable or unwilling to take their medicines as intended, unless this lack of “adherence” is identified and addressed, they are likely to just be prescribed more medicines or even higher dose.
In discussion about their medicines, older people describe their doctors not engaging in a meaningful way and in some cases ignoring harms that are being reported. This can mean some of the practical problems described above are not picked up either at the beginning of treatment or following reviews.
It will also mean that older people themselves will feel less involved in their care and less able to manage their health needs at home, including the risk that they ignore signs that medicines are not helping because “they must help if the doctor gives them to you”.
Aside from the fact that these medicines are destined to go to waste, it also leaves older people with their conditions still unmanaged; exposing them to unnecessary pain and suffering or a more rapid decline in their wellbeing.
Ultimately, what someone is taking on any given day may bear little relation to either their needs at that point in time – i.e. responding to changes in their symptoms – or the long-term management of their health conditions.
Back in 2010/11, the government estimated that around £300 million worth of medicines were wasted every year, with £50 million of this wasted in care homes alone.
This will no doubt have increased alongside rising prescription levels (the overall medicines bill for the NHS went up 40 per cent between 2010/11 and 2017/18).
The unnecessary cost of medicines that are prescribed and taken but could and should be safely and beneficially stopped is also significant. Estimates suggest that it may be in the order of tens of millions of pounds.
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