Abstract
Frail older people often receive multiple concurrent medicines, despite limited evidence of effectiveness and growing evidence of the harms of medicines in this population and in combination. This international symposium, led by the geriatric pharmacology subcommittee of the clinical division of the International Union of Basic and Clinical Pharmacology (IUPHAR), will showcase innovations in all phases of drug evaluation that can inform more effective and safe use of medicines by frail older people. IUPHAR is a non-government organization in official relations with the WHO with the mission of improved health through pharmacology education and research. In this symposium Prof Hilmer (Australia) will highlight novel pre-clinical models that can be used to evaluate relevant exposures for older people, such as polypharmacy and deprescribing, as well as relevant outcomes such as healthspan and frailty. Clinical evaluation of drugs in frail older people using new techniques, such as population pharmacokinetic modelling and pharmacogenomics, will be described by Prof Schwartz (USA). Prof Abernethy (USA) will describe regulatory issues such as the representativeness of clinical trial populations. Prof Le Couteur (Australia) and Prof Thuermann (Germany) will demonstrate novel approaches to pharmacovigilance in frail older people. All speakers will consider the effects of age, frailty and sex on clinical pharmacology and safe, effective therapeutics.