To examine the medicine-taking habits of a representative sample of elderly people from the viewpoint of these elderly people and of the main prescribers of these medicines, their general practitioners The elderly people's health, their views and experiences of their general practitioners and the prescribed or non-prescribed medicines they take or use; their general views about medicine-taking and pharmacists' assessments of the medicines that they do take; the views and experiences of general practitioners on prescribing for the elderly and their knowledge of particular patients; elderly people's contacts with hospitals and their helpers and supporters; medicines that elderly people hoard. Measurement Scales Nottingham Health Profile; Isaacs and Walkey's Mental Impairment Measurement