My dad was on an anti-psychotic drug. The doctors at Yale put him on it when he first started getting violent. The drug is mentioned in this article, which says dementia patients on such drugs are more likely to die. Elderly people with dementia who are given antipsychotics, even for a very short period of time, are more likely to end up in the hospital or even die....However, the problems underlying the need for such medications, behavioral problems such as aggression and agitation, are very real, and the alternatives to antipsychotics are limited... Yeah--treat the aggression and maybe kill the patient, or allow the patient to harm or even kill someone else? That's a conundrum. And yes, I'm being sarcastic. According to information gleaned from medical records, community-dwelling adults who had recently received a prescription for a newer antipsychotic medication were 3.2 times more likely than individuals who had received no antipsychotic therapy to be hospitalized or to die during 30 days of follow-up. Of course, my dad was on them for at least 6 months before he died, and he wasn't given them only when he went into the nursing home. Honestly I don't believe they contributed to his death. ( Screenprint; PMID: 18504337 )
Elderly people with dementia who are given antipsychotics, even for a very short period of time, are more likely to end up in the hospital or even die....However, the problems underlying the need for such medications, behavioral problems such as aggression and agitation, are very real, and the alternatives to antipsychotics are limited...
Yeah--treat the aggression and maybe kill the patient, or allow the patient to harm or even kill someone else? That's a conundrum. And yes, I'm being sarcastic.
According to information gleaned from medical records, community-dwelling adults who had recently received a prescription for a newer antipsychotic medication were 3.2 times more likely than individuals who had received no antipsychotic therapy to be hospitalized or to die during 30 days of follow-up.
Of course, my dad was on them for at least 6 months before he died, and he wasn't given them only when he went into the nursing home. Honestly I don't believe they contributed to his death.
( Screenprint; PMID: 18504337 )