Medication Management Capacity in Highly Functioning Community‐Living Older Adults: Detection of Early Deficits

Abstract

There is an association between performance on the DRUGS tool and level of cognitive function. The DRUGS tool represents a unique individualized, yet standardized, assessment of the ability to function independently for ambulatory older persons. It may be useful for identifying those highly functioning older persons, at an early phase of cognitive decline, in whom targeted intervention would likely be most effective and efficient.

Medication Management Assessment for Older Adults in the Community

“…; Edelberg, Shallenberger, & Wei, 1999;Fitten, Coleman, Siembieda, Yu, & Ganzell, 1995;Meyer & Schuna, 1989;Patterson et al, 2002;Raehl, Bond, Woods, Patry, & Sleeper, 2002;Ruscin & Semla, 1996), questionnaires (Bennett et al, 2001;de Klerk, van der Heijde, Landewe, van der Tempel, & van der Linden, 2003;Yamada, Sugiyama, Ashida, Ohwaki, & Fujii, 2001), home-based measures (Brown et al, 1998;Stewart, Pearson, Luke, & Horowitz, 1998;West et al, 1997), and pharmacy-type interventions (patient education, pharmacist-developed discharge plans; Ali, Laurin, Lariviere, Tremblay, & Cloutier, 2003;Al-Rashed, Wright, Roebuck, Sunter, & Chrystyn, 2002;Grant, Devita, Singer, & Meigs, 2003;Hoffman et al, 2003;Jensen, 2003;Lowe, Raynor, Purvis, Farrin, & Hudson, 2000;Nazareth et al, 2001;Sturgess, McElnay, Hughes, & Crealey, 2003). A majority of the measures are limited by either their use by clinic patients or with patients using a specific drug type, narrow coverage of compliance issues, little utility for use with an entire drug regimen, lack of validation testing, or testing outside the United States.…”

Acceptability and Face Validity of a Geriatric Self-Medication Assessment Tool

“…23 Evidence is also available that the ability to recall one's own medication regimen is associated with the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) score and that a decline may predict the need for future assistance with medication self-management, as well as other aspects of daily living. 9,10,24 As shown with the BMQ tool, recall screening can be highly sensitive to sporadic noncompliance. 11 The issue of how to phrase recall questions was addressed by many interviewees in the present study.…”

“…The Drug Regimen Unassisted Grading Scale (DRUGS) incorporated a stepwise progression of 4 tasks: identification, access, dosage, and timing. 9,10 This scale allows the assessor to calculate a score that has been found to be useful in identifying early deficits that can increase risk in medication self-management. 10 However, the DRUGS was evaluated in only a small cohort of well-educated, highly functioning older adults, and the power of the study was insufficient to detect differences in clinical outcomes.…”

Uso seguro de los medicamentos en adultos mayores: una lista de chequeo

“…Para la medición de la CMM se han diseñado una serie de instrumentos, el que tiene el mejor perfil de rendimiento y es la más utilizado es la escala de medición de capacidad de auto-administración de medicamentos (Drug Regimen Unassisted Grading Scale o DRUGS) (29) .…”