Over the counter medication
June 2005
Older people and OTC medicines
Polypharmacy of prescribed medicines is more prevalent among older people and increases the potential for drug interactions when OTC medicines are used. Older people’s consultations with health professionals often omit discussions of OTC medicines, and there have been calls for medication histories to include documentation of any OTC medicines taken (Barnett et al 2000). In the UK, changes in NHS policy have led to more frequent reviews of patients’ medicines and it is important that these take OTC medicines into account.
Older people were found to request help from the pharmacist more often than young adults in one US study and were also more likely to read OTC labels ‘completely’ (Sansgiry and Cady 1996).