polypharmacy
This package analyse prescription drugs deliveries to calculate
several indicators of polypharmacy corresponding to the various
definitions found in the literature.
It is essential to know the concepts used to calculate the various
polypharmacy indicators to adequately use this package.
The core of the package is the data_process() function that
creates the data.table of pharmacists drug deliveries by
restructuring the drug delivery records (usually extracted from a
pharmacy or a health insurance information system) into continuous
periods of drug availability, applying user-defined arguments such as
the grace periods between renewals or the longest treatment duration
that an individual may accumulate through the successive renewals.
Then, each polypharmacy indicator can be computed using the
corresponding function (ind_simult(),
ind_stdcumul(), ind_wcumul(),
ind_stdcontinuous(), ind_ucontinuous()) or
using the overall function indicators() and select all the
desired indicator(s) to be calculated at once.
Prior to running data_process() the user may need to
pre-process the table of original drug delivery records to break down
combination drug into their individual components
(drugs_bkdn()) and/or to overwrite the treatment duration
of specified drugs with constant time periods
(cst_trt_dur()).
Installation
install.packages("polypharmacy")
Development version
To get a bug fix or to use a feature from the development version,
you can install the development version of polypharamcy
from GitHub.
# install.packages("remotes")
remotes::install_github("guiboucher/polypharmacy")
References
- Bjerrum, L., Rosholm, J. U., Hallas, J., & Kragstrup, J. (1997).
Methods for estimating the occurrence of polypharmacy by means of a
prescription database. [journal article]. European Journal of Clinical
Pharmacology, 53(1), 7-11. DOI: 10.1007/s002280050329
- Chan, D.-C., Hao, Y.-T., & Wu, S.-C. (2009a). Characteristics of
outpatient prescriptions for frail Taiwanese elders with long-term care
needs. Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety, 18(4), 327-334. DOI: 10.1002/pds.1712
- Fincke, B. G., Snyder, K., Cantillon, C., Gaehde, S., Standring, P.,
Fiore, L., . . . Gagnon, D. R. (2005). Three complementary definitions
of polypharmacy: methods, application and comparison of findings in a
large prescription database. Pharmacoepidemiol Drug Saf, 14(2), 121-128.
DOI: 10.1002/pds.966
- Hovstadius, B., Astrand, B., & Petersson, G. (2009). Dispensed
drugs and multiple medications in the Swedish population: an
individual-based register study.(Technical advance)(Report). BMC
Clinical Pharmacology, 9(11), 11. DOI: 10.1186/1472-6904-9-11
- Hovstadius, B., Astrand, B., & Petersson, G. (2010). Assessment
of regional variation in polypharmacy. Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug
Safety, 19(4), 375-383. DOI: 10.1002/pds.1921
- Kennerfalk, A., Ruigómez, A., Wallander, M.-A., Wilhelmsen, L.,
& Johansson, S. (2002). Geriatric Drug Therapy and Healthcare
Utilization in the United Kingdom. Annals of Pharmacotherapy, 36(5),
797-803. DOI: 10.1345/aph.1A226
- Masnoon, N., Shakib, S., Kalisch-Ellett, L., & Caughey, G. E.
(2017). What is polypharmacy? A systematic review of definitions. BMC
Geriatr, 17(1), 230. DOI: 10.1186/s12877-017-0621-2
- Narayan, S. W., & Nishtala, P. S. (2015). Associations of
Potentially Inappropriate Medicine Use with Fall-Related
Hospitalisations and Primary Care Visits in Older New Zealanders: A
Population-Level Study Using the Updated 2012 Beers Criteria. [journal
article]. Drugs - Real World Outcomes, 2(2), 137-141. DOI: 10.1007/s40801-015-0020-y
- Nishtala, P. S., & Salahudeen, M. S. (2015). Temporal Trends in
Polypharmacy and Hyperpolypharmacy in Older New Zealanders over a 9-Year
Period: 2005-2013. Gerontology, 61(3), 195-202. DOI: 10.1159/000368191
- Park, H. Y., Ryu, H. N., Shim, M. K., Sohn, H. S., & Kwon, J. W.
(2016). Prescribed drugs and polypharmacy in healthcare service users in
South Korea: an analysis based on National Health Insurance Claims data.
Int J Clin Pharmacol Ther, 54(5), 369-377. DOI: 10.5414/cp202484
- Veehof, L., Stewart, R., Haaijer-Ruskamp, F., & Jong, B. M.
(2000). The development of polypharmacy. A longitudinal study. Fam
Pract, 17(3), 261-267. DOI: 10.1093/fampra/17.3.261