Medicine Use Among the Rural Elderly

Abstract

Direct and indirect relationships between predisposing, enabling and need-for-care factors and the use of prescribed and over-the-counter (OTC) medicine were examined among the rural elderly. Data were gathered through personal interviews conducted among a stratified random sample (based on geographic grids) of persons aged 60 or older residing in a northern Mississippi [USA] county. Anxiety, perceived morbidity and perceived availability of pharmacy services exerted direct effects on prescribed-medicine use, while several other predisposing and enabling factors exerted only indirect effects. The model derived for OTC-medicine use was much simpler: only anxiety and transportation exerted direct effects; anxiety and other predisposing variables exerted indirect effects through transportation. The model proved a better predictor of prescribed- than OTC-medicine use.