Tas dementia patients more drugged than interstate
Researchers at the University of Tasmania are working on a project to reduce the use of tranquilisers and antipsychotics in the state’s nursing homes.
Preliminary studies by the School of Pharmacy have found the use of benzodiazepines to control the behaviour of patients with dementia is the highest in the country.
Professor Gregory Peterson is leading the $200,000 project, funded by the Department of Health and Ageing. He says benzodiazepine and antipsychotic drugs are a risky form of therapy for elderly people with dementia and Alzheimers.
“In the older patient there’s a risk of drops in blood pressure and faintness and falls and therefore the risk of hip fracture is one of the major sorts of epidemiological risk factors that’s been associated with these drugs,” he says.
“There are a number of factors involved, probably related to staffing within nursing homes and perhaps even residents’ relatives expectations. So that there’s a whole multi-factorial issue that’s certainly not just something that we can blame GPs for, for instance.”
Professor Peterson says his researchers will collaborate with the medical profession in developing joint strategies to tackle the problem.
