A new investigation published by the Sunday Times this month says UK doctors are over-prescribing medicines to such an extent that hundreds of thousands of older patients have to seek medical help at hospital emergency departments every year – because mixing drugs can cause potentially harmful side-effects.
The report found that GPs are often prescribing a ‘cocktail of drugs’ to try and help older patients but they could actually be harming their health, with around 1000 older people attending A&E every day because of the adverse affects of mixing medicines.
According to NHS data, irregular heartbeats, low blood pressure and dizziness were some of the side-effects of combining prescribed drugs that elderly patients were found to be presenting with.
Research published earlier this year found that around 2.2million people in the UK take ten prescribed drugs every day, with around eight million – around 15% of the UK population – on five or more drugs, which is known as ‘polypharmacy’.
The Beyond Pills campaign, established and supported by The College of Medicine, seeks to move UK healthcare beyond an over-reliance on pills by combining social prescribing, lifestyle medicine, psychosocial interventions and safe deprescribing.
Beyond Pills was first established in the wake of the National Overprescribing Review in 2021, which found that 10% of prescribed drugs (approximately 110 million items) are unnecessary and may cause harm, with adverse drug reactions account for 10-20% of hospital in-patient admission.
Polypharmacy leading to harmful effects is linked to NHS shortcomings, studies have suggested, with doctors unable to assess patients thoroughly because of short appointment times and heavy workloads – meaning clinicians are much more likely to treat individual health issues rather than considering the overall health of patients. Side-effects of medicines can often be treated as a separate condition, which is then treated with another prescribed drug.
The Sunday Times is calling on the following to abate the ongoing impact of polypharmacy:
- All medical students must learn the risks of mixing medicines and receive training for how and when to de-prescribe
- The NHS should ensure that anyone over 65 who is considered frail and is taking 10 or more medications is invited for an annual review of their drug regimen
- 1,850 more geriatricians must be trained by 2030 to ensure there is one doctor for every 500 patients aged 85 and over