April 01, 2008Report: Antipsychotics Killing Thousands Of Brits With DementiaA report by a British MP, Paul Burstow, claims that the use of antipsychotics in patients with dementia is leading to 23,000 deaths a year in the UK, according to this account of the report in the Telegraph (London). This makes you wonder how the wide use of drugs like Zyprexa, Risperdal and Seroquel is playing out in America, or what a similar report here would find. Burstow's report is here. "Mr Burstow cited a yet-to-be published study by King's College London that gave a placebo to one group of Alzheimer's patients and anti-psychotics to another for 12 months. That unpublished study cited above should send shivers down anyone's spine because not only are we using lots of antipsychotics on older folks in America--and the UK--but we are using tons of the same drugs on children (mostly boys) and on adults for conditions that have nothing to do with psychosis. Bipolar disorder type II, depression, anxiety and ADHD. I don't often use terms like "scandal" and "scam," but I think the way antipsychotics are being handed out by doctors and the way they are pushed by pharma companies amounts to a scandal and a scam. I am at the point where I really don't even know what to suggest as a means of addressing this situation. "Mr Burstow said: 'Using drugs to restrain vulnerable older people with dementia is no different to strapping them to a chair. It is an abuse of their human rights. Ministers are guilty of being complacent. There should a ban on prescribing anti-psychotic drugs in all but the most severe cases of dementia.'" While I am not a fan of banning the use of drugs of any kind, I am beginning to think that we really, really need to go back to the good old days of mental health care (OK, they weren't that good) when there was essentially a taboo on the use of antipsychotics for anything other than treating psychosis. BTW, if anyone thinks I am joking about how widespread the use of these drugs have become, then they should consider that antipsychotics are now the third largest class of drugs sold in the US in terms of revenue, outpacing even anti-depressants which now sit in fourth place. Burstow is correct that there is simply far too much complacency around the use of antipsychotics. I wonder what it's going to take to shock this country and the UK out of their complacency. Thoughts? (Via Atypical Antipsychotics.) Posted by Philip Dawdy at April 1, 2008 11:24 AM
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I worked as a nurse's aid in nursing homes for years. I went on to become a geriatric social worker, mainly doing nursing home placement which kind of comes with the territory with that population. I would a HEAP rather be tied to my chair, thank you, than drugged. Have a nice day, everyone. Don't let the Old Age Truck hit you. I wish I could say this is news to me (even though it's certainly bad news) but I've been aware at some level that old people in nursing homes are being drugged to the hilt and that it shortens their lives for some time. Not really a surprise -- consistent with everything else we've been learning here on this blog and elsewhere. Psychiatry -- one might even say medicine itself -- can be really creepy when confronted with disabled and compromised, even just debilitated, individuals. Posted by: Sara at April 1, 2008 06:28 PMPost a comment
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