Objectives:

Polypharmacy is a widely used concept in clinical practice. However, there are a lot of cut point in literature. There are a lot of evidence about the fact of a greater number of medications, patients may present a greater number of adverse events and less therapeutic adherence. The objective of this study is to analyze association between polypharmacy -as 10 medications or more- in elderly patients (> 65 years) attended in the emergency department (ED), with mortality, hospitalization and readmission in ED.

Methodology:

Retrospective descriptive study of 591 patients in which univariate, bivariate and multivariate statistics were performed, establishing a p < 0.05.

Results:

There are significant association between polypharmacy and mortality and hospitalization at 3, 6 and 9 months. There are association with readmission to ED at 6 and 9 months too. These data are clinically relevant in the association between polypharmacy and mortality, both short and medium term. Patients with polypharmacy obtained 1.66 (1.12, 2.44) times more risk than patients without polypharmacy.

Conclusions:

Polypharmacy, as 10 or more drugs, is an optimal cut-off point to detect high-risk patients over 65 years old in ED. The selection of these patients could help to make decisions in the clinical practice, optimize treatment and promote the inclusion of this patients in high-risk specific programs.

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