To the Editor We commend Chaudhry et al1 on their excellent article that reported high prevalence of symptoms that negatively affect functioning and quality of life in a cohort of older community-dwelling people with multimorbidity and a life expectancy of less than 1 year.
In older people, mulitimorbidity often coexists with polypharmacy, commonly defined as the use of 5 or more drugs. In her Invited Commentary, Ritchie2 highlights that pharmacological treatment of 1 symptom may exacerbate another or a coexisting condition, which may in part explain the increase in symptoms in this population.