At around 25%-50% of our senior population showed evidences of medication noncompliance and unfortunately, it’s still gaining in numbers due to many varying reasons, primarily being the stiff cost of these prescribed medications—something our health care providers fail to see or they just simply ignore.
Usually upon reaching the age of 40, there are already maintenance drugs that will be prescribed by your physician. These are drugs that will prevent further damage or worsening of your condition considering all factors such as hereditary and lifestyle. Within this age bracket, your prescribed medications are typically multivitamins, soft gel capsules and others—all of which are within reasonable price range and of course, they are not too detrimental to your health if you skip one day.
If only seniors could stay this way forever; unfortunately as seniors grow older, the costs of their medications grow alongside them as well. Plus let’s not forget all those reports we are receiving about these prescription drugs namely: their long term side-effects and potential complications. To a senior buying them at high prices, one thing is definitely running in their minds, “..and I am paying for those as well?”
Although it is quite understandable at times but seniors must know that it is indeed dangerous for their health to stay noncompliant to their prescribed medications. Noncompliant simply means cutting back on prescribed dosage or not taking the medications at all and it is a very rampant practice among senior citizen today.
Another survey revealed that sometimes seniors tend to inadvertently forget their medications or confuse them with other drugs—something that seniors can’t help doing so either by accident or mental illness. This mistake proves to be very unsafe and can be fatal at times.
Medication noncompliance committed by seniors can immediately lead to serious health issues and untimely death. Over-medication can cause liver problems to seniors while under-medicating will expose you to your dormant disease’s complications. For every chronic condition that you may have right now, there is almost always a drug or two to take care of it so the more illnesses you have, the more medications you have to manage. Certain medications can cause you problems such as sleeping difficulties, dizziness and others but it is not advisable that you stop them at once. In cases like these, talking to your doctor will be the next best step a senior like you should take. If you are planning to stop taking all your prescribed medications for some reason, it is much better if you take your case to another doctor rather than not seeking professional medical help at all.
There are also other alternatives that you may want to explore such as herbal medicines, alternative health practices and lifestyle changes. All of these can assist you in managing your health problems better but you still need a professional advice for that. It is extremely important for seniors to regularly check with their doctors because they are the ones that can help us in time of need.
