Polypharmacy, length of hospital stay, and in-hospital mortality among elderly patients in internal medicine wards. The REPOSI study

PURPOSES: We evaluated the prevalence and factors associated with polypharmacy and investigated the role of polypharmacy as a predictor of length of hospital stay and in-hospital mortality. METHODS: Thirty-eight internal medicine wards in Italy participated in the Registro Politerapie SIMI (REPOSI) study during 2008. One thousand three hundred and thirty-two in-patients aged ≥65 years were enrolled. Polypharmacy was defined as the concomitant use of five or more medications. Linear regression analyses were used to evaluate predictors of length of hospital stay and logistic regression models for predictors of in-hospital mortality. Age, sex, Charlson comorbidity index, polypharmacy, and numb…