Although there is evidence of a growing
awareness of the problem, no official policy statements or
regulatory guidelines on polypharmacy have been released
up to date by Italian Health Authorities. Medication
review, application of appropriateness criteria and
computerized prescription support systems are all possible
approaches in order to improve the quality of prescribing
in older persons. More focused training courses on
multimorbidity and polytherapy management are
encouraged. Furthermore a multidisciplinary approach
integrating different health care professionals (physicians,
pharmacists, and nurses) may positively impact on
reducing the sense of fear related to discontinue or
substitute drugs prescribed by others; the fragmentation of
therapy among different specialists; reducing costs; and
improving adverse drug reaction detection and reporting.
Aiming at achieving the individualized pharmacotherapy,
a multidisciplinary approach starting with identification of
patients and risk for drug-related problems, followed by
medication review overtime and use of inappropriateness
criteria, supported by computerized systems has been
proposed
