[h=1]Sharp Rise Reported in Older Americans? Use of Multiple Psychotropic Drugs[/h] By
BENEDICT CAREYFEB. 13, 2017
The number of retirement-age Americans taking at least three psychiatric drugs more than doubled between 2004 and 2013, even though almost half of them had no
mental health diagnosis on record, researchers reported on Monday.
The new analysis, based on data from doctors? office visits, suggests that inappropriate prescribing to older people is more common than previously thought. Office visits are a close, if not exact, estimate of underlying patient numbers. The paper appears in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine.
Geriatric medical organizations have long warned against overprescribing to older people, who are more susceptible to common side effects of psychotropic drugs, such as
dizziness and confusion. For more than 20 years, the American Geriatrics Society has published the so-called
Beers Criteria for potentially inappropriate use, listing dozens of drugs and their mutual interactions...
