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Table 2 Baseline characteristics, by whether the participants had a new prescription of a potentially inappropriate medication (PIM) during the 90-day follow-up period

From: Patient factors associated with new prescribing of potentially inappropriate medications in multimorbid US older adults using multiple medications

 

All patients

Patients with new PIM prescription during follow-up

Patients without new PIM prescription during follow-up

Absolute standardized differencesd

(n = 17,912)

(n = 447)

(N = 17,465)

Demographic characteristics

 Mean age in years (SD)

78.0 (7.5)

77.0 (7.5)

78.0 (7.5)

0.13

 Female sex (%)

10,497 (58.6)

225 (50.3)

10,272 (58.8)

0.17

 Hispanic ethnicity (%)

161 (0.9)

**

**

0.04

 Race (%)

 

  White

16,593 (92.6)

398 (89.0)

16,195 (92.7)

0.13

  Black

653 (3.7)

24 (5.4)

629 (3.6)

  Asian

165 (0.9)

**

**

  Other

417 (2.3)

17 (3.8)

400 (2.3)

  No information

84 (0.5)

**

**

Medication intake

 Mean (SD) drug items dispensed per patient with min. 90 days’ supply

6.1 (1.4)

6.2 (1.4)

6.1 (1.4)

0.07

 Mean (SD) drug items dispensed

8.0 (2.4)

8.2 (2.5)

8.0 (2.4)

0.08

Healthcare utilization

 Patients with at least 1 inpatient stay (%)

3001 (16.7)

97 (21.7)

2904 (16.6)

0.13

 Patients with at least 1 emergency department visit (%)

4711 (26.3)

143 (32.0)

4568 (26.2)

0.13

 Patients with at least 1 non-acute institutional stay (%)

2360 (13.2)

45 (10.1)

2315 (13.3)

0.10

 Patients with number of ambulatory visits above the median number of ambulatory visits (median = 17) (%)b

9186 (51.3)

293 (65.6)

8893 (50.9)

0.30

Number of chronic conditions

 Mean (SD) number of chronic conditions

5.1 (2.3)

5.4 (2.5)

5.1 (2.3)

0.12

Chronic conditions typesa (%)

 Congestive heart failure

2931 (16.4)

103 (23.0)

2828 (16.2)

0.17

 Cardiac arrhythmias

1061 (5.9)

37 (8.3)

1024 (5.9)

0.10

 Valvular disease

2109 (11.8)

56 (12.5)

2053 (11.8)

0.02

 Pulmonary circulation disorders

399 (2.2)

83 (18.6)

2748 (15.7)

0.08

 Peripheral vascular disorders

2525 (14.1)

70 (16.7)

2455 (14.1)

0.05

 Hypertension

11,309 (63.1)

285 (63.8)

11,024 (63.1)

0.01

 Chronic pulmonary disorders

2831 (15.8)

83 (18.6)

2748 (15.7)

0.08

 Diabetes

5718 (31.9)

161 (36.0)

5557 (31.8)

0.09

 Hypothyroidism

2531 (14.1)

59 (13.2)

2472 (14.2)

0.03

 Renal failure

1669 (9.3)

46 (10.3)

1623 (9.3)

0.03

 Liver disease

274 (1.5)

**

**

0.08

 Cancer

2447 (13.7)

67 (15.0)

2380 (13.6)

0.04

 Rheumatoid arthritis / collagen vascular diseases

940 (5.3)

20 (4.5)

920 (5.3)

0.04

 Coagulopathy

619 (3.5)

19 (4.3)

600 (3.4)

0.04

 Fluid and electrolyte disorders

783 (4.4)

25 (5.6)

758 (4.3)

0.06

 Psychoses

309 (1.7)

**

**

0.05

 Depression

1580 (8.8)

38 (8.5)

1542 (8.8)

0.01

Other characteristics

 

Mean frailty index (SD)c

0.16 (0.1)

0.16 (0.1)

0.16 (0.1)

0.04

  1. Missing data < 2% for all variables listed. acomorbidities defined with coding algorithms for defining Elixhauser comorbidities in ICD-9 administrative data (Quan et al. 2005), ≥2 ICD-9 codes per category, hypertension categories merged, diabetes categories merged, different cancer categories merged, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, obesity, weight loss, HIV/AIDS, paralysis, other neurological disorders, blood loss anemia and deficiency anemia not presented; bdue to our cohort definition all patients had min. 1 ambulatory visit during the baseline period; cKim DH, Schneeweiss S, Lipsitz LA, Glynn R, Rockwood K, Avorn J. Measuring Frailty in Medicare Data: Development and Validation of a Claims-Based Frailty Index. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2018; 73: 980–987. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/gerona/glx229. PMID: 29244057; PMCID: PMC6001883; d A significant difference between the proportions of patients is usually characterized by an absolute standardized difference ≥ ±0.1; **cells < 11 suppressed for data protection reasons according to Medicare requirements
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BMC Geriatrics

ISSN: 1471-2318

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