National guidance

In Scotland, it has been national policy to address inappropriate polypharmacy since 2012 when the first guidance requiring health boards to take action to address avoidable harm was published.

In 2014, NICE published medicines optimisation guidance and in 2019 the Royal Pharmaceutical Society published a position paper highlighting the problem of polypharmacy and what could be done by pharmacists to address this. 

Global guidance

In March 2017, the WHO launched its third patient safety challenge, Medication Without Harm. Patient safety is an important component of healthcare delivery, which is essential in achieving universal health coverage and moving towards the sustainable development goals set out by WHO. It is estimated that over half of medicines globally are prescribed, dispensed or sold inappropriately. 

The goal is to reduce severe avoidable harm from medicines by 50 per cent over the next five years. In order to address this, WHO identified three ‘flagship’ areas: high-risk medicines, polypharmacy and transitions of care. The flagship reports and a webinar are available here.

The World Health Organization has produced a range of materials for patients to inform discussions with healthcare professionals so that they:

• Know what their medications are
• Can check they are using the medications in the right way
• Are able to ask for information from their healthcare professional, who will support them in taking their medications appropriately.