Prevalence and predictors of polypharmacy among community-based individuals with traumatic spinal cord injury

This study aimed to find out how common polypharmacy is among people with traumatic spinal cord injuries (TSCI) who live in the community. Polypharmacy is when someone takes five or more medicines each day. The study also looked at what might make someone more likely to be on multiple medications. The researchers checked things like how severe the spinal cord injury was, how well people could do daily tasks, and any other health problems they had. They used special scales to measure these things. By looking at all this information, they could see what factors were linked to taking many different medicines. The study found that polypharmacy is common in people with TSCI. Also, people with complete injuries, older individuals, and those who have had the injury for a longer time were more likely to be taking multiple medications. These findings can help doctors understand who is at risk for polypharmacy and potentially reduce the number of medicines they take.

• 1
  The study found that 50.7% of the patients with chronic traumatic SCI had polypharmacy.
• 2
  The predictors of polypharmacy were completeness of injury, advancing age, and longer injury duration.
• 3
  The most frequently used drug combination was the combination of anti-spasticity drugs, anti-muscarinic drugs, and gabapentinoid drugs for neuropathic pain.