Association between quality indicators of drug use and clinical outcomes adjusted for age, sex and time-varying comorbidities
| Indicator | All-cause admission to hospital n = 162 264 | Fracture-specific admission to hospital n = 8 220 | Death n = 24 740 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. of patients | OR (95% CI) | p value | No. of patients | OR (95% CI) | p value | No. of patients | OR (95% CI) | p value | |
| Polypharmacy, no. of drugs | |||||||||
| 1–4 | 42 256 | 1.00 | 2 877 | 1.00 | 4 463 | 1.00 | |||
| 5–9 | 64 902 | 1.34 (1.32–1.36) | < 0.001 | 3 306 | 1.18 (1.12–1.24) | < 0.001 | 5 317 | 0.97 (0.93–1.01) | 0.1 |
| ≥ 10 | 27 612 | 1.98 (1.94–2.03) | < 0.001 | 1 056 | 1.54 (1.42–1.66) | < 0.001 | 1 131 | 0.59 (0.56–0.64) | < 0.001 |
| Use of PIMs | |||||||||
| No | 71 946 | 1.00 | 3 910 | 1.00 | 17 987 | 1.00 | |||
| Yes | 90 318 | 1.27 (1.25–1.28) | < 0.001 | 4 910 | 1.55 (1.48–1.62) | < 0.001 | 6 753 | 0.39 (0.38–0.40) | < 0.001 |
| ARS score | |||||||||
| 0 | 122 302 | 1.00 | 6 904 | 1.00 | 21 603 | 1.00 | |||
| 1–2 | 27 123 | 1.46 (1.43–1.49) | < 0.001 | 1 250 | 1.39 (1.31–1.48) | < 0.001 | 2 350 | 0.75 (0.72–0.79) | < 0.001 |
| ≥ 3 | 12 839 | 1.32 (1.28–1.35) | < 0.001 | 666 | 1.53 (1.41–1.66) | < 0.001 | 787 | 0.49 (0.45–0.53) | < 0.001 |
Note: ARS = anticholinergic risk scale, CI = confidence interval, PIM = potentially inappropriate medication.