A study was made of the medical charts of 433 elderly patients admitted to four Health Related Facilities in upper New York State, to determine whether the respective prescription orders for vitamins and minerals were appropriate to the given diagnoses and, if not, identify the variables correlated with inappropriateness. For 11.1 percent of the patients, vitamins or minerals were prescribed when there was no specific diagnostic indication, or they were not prescribed when the medical diagnosis indicated that they should have been. Women and medicaid patients were more likely than men and self-paying patients to be treated inappropriately with respect to vitamins and minerals, but the differences were not satistically significant.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.