Up to 1,800 elderly dementia patients are dying each year from wrongly prescribed anti-psychotic drugs, a Government report has found.
Only around 36,000 of the 180,000 people currently on the drugs in the UK need them, the report said, leaving 144,000 people taking them unnecessarily.
Anti-psychotic medicines are licensed to treat people with schizophrenia and are used off-licence for dementia patients in care homes and hospitals.
In his review, Sube Banerjee, professor of mental health and ageing at the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London, said the rate of use of anti-psychotic drugs could be cut to one third of its current level with appropriate action.
Thursday, 12 November 2009
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2 comments:
Well so it looks like sz clients have a Government-sponsored compulsory death sentence hanging over them backed up by compulsory treatment orders for anyone who won't go Quietly! My quibble with anti-psychotics is that they cause bigger problems than they solve. Diabetes is you bag if you so much as indulge the atypical treatment for schizophrenia. Death sentence enough, methinks...
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