Abstract
Over 80% of people aged ≥65 years use pharmacological drugs. Older people are more susceptible to adverse effects of drugs because of altered pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics combined with multiple diseases, impairments and polypharmacy. We analyze large Swedish national registers to investigate drug treatment among people aged ≥65 years with special focus on polypharmacy (≥5 drugs), inappropriate drug treatment, dementia and the risk of negative outcomes. The most commonly used drugs among older people are cardiovascular drugs, analgesics and psychotropics and their use vary with age, sex, residential setting and dementia status. At age 65 years, approximately 8 years of the 20 remaining years of life can be expected to be lived with polypharmacy. Inappropriate drug treatment is associated with negative outcomes such as hospitalization. These pharmacoepidemiological findings from large-scale human data will feed into experimental animal models to verify outcomes and identify mechanisms and biomarkers.