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Mismanaging Prescription Medications Among Rural Elders

The Effects of Socioeconomic Status, Health Status, and Medication Profile Indicators

^a Center on Aging, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC
^b Department of Anthropology, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC
^c Department of Sociology, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC
^d Department of English, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC

Correspondence: Jim Mitchell, PhD, Center on Aging, School of Medicine, East Carolina University, Physicians Quadrangle, Building N, Greenville, NC 27858-4354. E-mail: mitchellj{at}mail.ecu.edu.

Laurence G. Branch, PhD

Purpose: This study assessed the extent to which community-dwelling rural older adults mismanage their prescription medication regimens and predicted mismanagement of medications from selected socioeconomic, health status, and medication profile char-acteristics. Design and Methods: Personal interviews with 499 community-dwelling adults aged 66 and over taking at least one prescription medication and living in a rural region of the Southeast. With approximately equal numbers of African American and white men and women, the SUDAAN multiple logistic regression procedure was used to predict the mismanagement of prescription medications. Results: The mismanagement of prescribed medication regimens is relatively common among older adults. Those more likely than others to mismanage their regimens are African American, younger, in poorer mental health, with more acute care physician visits, and those who find payment for their medications to be problematic. Implications: The implications of the findings for what is known about the self-modification of drug regimens, targeting prescription drug cost benefits or interventions, and the limitations of the study are discussed.

Key Words: Aging • Prescription drug mismanagement • Noncompliance