NY Times had a great article on the too common practice of overmedicating residents in nursing homes. Nursing homes often chemically restrain residents because it is easier: No complaints, no call bells, no requests. Management can then staff less people on certain shifts especially at night. Paula Spann wrote a great article.
Within three months of admission, a team of University of South Florida researchers determined, 71 percent of Medicaid residents in Florida nursing homes were receiving a psychoactive medication — an antidepressant or anti-psychotic, or dementia drugs — even though most were not taking such drugs in the months before they moved in and didn’t have psychiatric diagnoses. 15 percent of residents were taking four or more such medications. Only 12 percent were getting nondrug treatments like behavioral therapy.
The article mentions Victor Molinari, a professor of aging at the University of South Florida and lead author of the study. He wasn’t startled by those statistics. “They confirmed what I suspected,” he told me in an interview. “And people who work in nursing homes wouldn’t be surprised. It seems the use of psychoactive medication is trumping the use of nondrug treatments,” Dr. Molinari said. And given the possible interactions with the many other drugs most residents take, an average 10 or more prescriptions, “it could well be that we’re causing problems like falls, confusion and delirium, and hospitalizations,” he cautioned.
Nursing homes’ reliance on psychoactive drugs has troubled professionals in geriatrics for years. In many states, residents being admitted directly from hospitals are exempt from screening. As a result, federal data show, fewer than half of residents with major mental illnesses receive the mandated assessment. Only half of nursing homes provide weekly patient consultations with psychiatrists, psychologists or other mental health experts; even fewer provide consultations with those who specialize in working with seniors. In addition, staffs are stretched thin and inadequately trained in mental health care. With a pill a quicker and simpler intervention than the alternatives, intentional overuse is the result. If the aide had fewer patients to care for or if management increased staffing numbers, and more time to soothe one who was agitated, if she’d had better training in responding to behavioral problems, she might be able to handle behavioral issues.
The Justice Department brought criminal charges against Eli Lilly, accusing the big pharmaceutical firm of illegally marketing its anti-psychotic Zyprexa to doctors who work in nursing homes and assisted living facilities, and encouraging them to prescribe it for sleep disorders and dementia. Its approved use is to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Lilly agreed to pay $1.4 billion in a related civil settlement.
“For years, I’ve had calls from family members saying, ‘Mom was completely lucid when she went into the nursing home, and a week later she no longer recognized us,’” said Janet Wells, public policy director of NCCNHR, formerly the National Citizens’ Coalition for Nursing Home Reform. “Families should question why drugs are prescribed, do some research. A lot of drugs are being used as restraints.”
Paula Span is the author of the recently published “When the Time Comes: Families With Aging Parents Share Their Struggles and Solutions.”
