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Elderly Getting “Inadequate” Primary Care
Healthypages
News
March 14, 2003
Many elderly
patients may be receiving inadequate medical care, particularly those in
nursing homes, according to a primary care study.
The researchers studied nearly 700 elderly people in Bristol and warn that
their results may reflect the situation throughout the UK.
The study, involving three general practices in the city, found overall
care standards to be inadequate, and that patients living in nursing homes
received worse care than those living at home.
“Inadequate care takes several different forms: insufficient use of
beneficial drugs; poor monitoring of chronic disease; and overuse of
inappropriate or unnecessary drugs,” the researchers write in the
British Medical Journal.
For example, the team found the frequency of blood pressure measurement
was poorer among nursing home residents, and nursing home residents were
less likely to have been offered pneumococcal vaccination.
More than a quarter of patients in nursing homes were taking
tranquillisers compared to only 11 per cent of people living at home. And
almost 40 per cent of nursing home residents were being prescribed a
laxative, compared with just 16 per cent of people living in their own
homes.
Of the group, 172 were residents in nursing homes and 526 were living at
home. All the people were aged 65 or over.
The team, led by Professor Tom Fahey from the Tayside Centre for General
Practice in Scotland, acknowledged that the study had several limitations,
for example, it failed to measure how recently the patient had been
discharged from hospital.
“The findings of this study need to be reproduced in a larger sample of
practices, with follow up of patients, so that the outcome of clinical
care can be assessed,” they write.
Annie Stevenson, policy officer for Help the Aged, said medical care for
older people, particularly those in care homes, gave cause for “profound
concern”.
“Lack of proper diagnosis and treatment is about the right to life;
inappropriate use of drugs is inhuman and degrading treatment,” she
said. “It is truly horrifying that sick older people can be treated in
this way and a measure of how far we have to go to root out age
discrimination in healthcare.”
Gordon Lishman, director-general of Age Concern, said the study raised
serious questions about the equity of older people’s access to medical
services.
“The National Service Framework for Older People includes a clear
commitment to improving medicines management by older people
themselves,” he said. “This crucial measure has been pressed for by
organisations including Age Concern and must be fully implemented.”
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