The risk of hyponatremia in the elderly compared with younger in the hospital inpatient and outpatient.

AIM to comparise the prevalences of hyponatremia between elderly and younger patients in hospital inpatients and outpatients setting. METHODS this study was done using cross-sectional design. Medical records of all adult patients (age of more than 13 years) from March 2008 to March 2009 in Siloam Hospital Lippo-Village whose sodium plasma level data were recorded. The patients were divided into two main groups according to their age, that were elderly and younger. These two main groups were then divided into 4 sub-groups that were general inpatient, special inpatient, general outpatient, and emergency outpatient. The prevalence ratio of the proportion of hyponatremia between the elderly and the younger in the four sub-groups were then analyzed. Independency between the 4 sub-groups and frequency of hyponatremia in each of the two main group were tested by Chi-Square test, using SPSS statistics version 17. RESULTS in the general inpatient, the prevalence of hyponatremia in the elderly group and the young group were 26.32% and 10.85% respectively, with the Prevalence Ratio of 2,43 (95% CI, 0,11-0,19). In the general outpatient, the prevalence of hyponatremia in the elderly group and the young group were 7.18% and 2.98% respectively, with the Prevalence Ratio of 2,40 (95% CI, 0,02-0,06). In the emergency outpatient, the prevalence of hyponatremia in the elderly group and the young group were 18.28% and 7.71% respectively, with the Prevalence Ratio of 2,37 (95% CI, 0,08-0,14). In the special inpatient, the prevalence of hyponatremia in the elderly group and the young group were 14.98% and 5.58% respectively, with the Prevalence Ratio of 2,69 (95% CI, 0,05-0,13). The risk to get hyponatremia during inpatient was significantly higher in the elderly with the Prevalence Ratio of 2.79 (95% CI, 0,03-0,07). Chi Square analysis which was done in both the elderly and the younger group revealed that the place of the services will influence the frequency of hyponatremia significantly (p = 0.000). CONCLUSION compared with the younger group, the mean of the risk for the elderly group to get hyponatremia in the hospital inpatient and outpatient is 2.54 times higher.