Just take your pills, grandpa.
CBC- Nearly a quarter of Winnipeg care home residents given antipsychotic drugs with no diagnosis
Winnipeg nursing home residents are being prescribed powerful antipsychotic drugs at an increasing rate to treat dementia and control behaviour, rather than what the drugs are meant for — to manage symptoms of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.
Elderly patients with dementia who are treated with antipsychotics have an increased risk of death, mostly due to cardiovascular concerns and infections, according to Health Canada.
Other studies have shown the drugs can increase the risk of falls and fractures in older adults. “You almost put this person into a zombie-like state,” said Dr. Samir Sinha, director of geriatrics at Sinai Health and University Health Network in Toronto.
An “influx of admissions” to nursing homes this year after capacity was reduced during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic is partly to blame, according to the spokesperson.
However, Sinha says the problem may be linked to staffing issues at care homes. “It’s why these behaviours become more problematic for example, and harder to manage — especially when you’re short-staffed,” he told CBC.
The CBC position is that 25% isn’t enough?
If you are a caregiver for a parent (or child or spouse) you need to get involved in their care, and you need to review their meds. Independently read up on all of them that you or your ward are taking, not just the antipsychotic drugs. Ask if the drug is still needed and/or can have serious adverse effects?
Examples? With my Mother, they prescribed a drug to slow her high heart rate. She started stumbling and falling in the two months she was on it. We convinced the doctor to first cut it back, then drop it, and her falls stopped for a while. They dropped the Statins when she reached 89 y.o. But it took a severe gastric ulcer to get them to stop the daily baby aspirin. Her insurance company even called us to ask why those drugs were no longer prescribed?
By the way, do not stop Donezepil / Aricept even if they do not seem to be slowing Alzheimers anymore. Several doctors said stopping it can cause a sharp decline in patients that were on it.
Doctors and NPAs and nurses are human. They do make mistakes and some people have atypical drug responses. Do not be afraid to ask the questions.
Good points.
And for a little more context, this is not a new issue; it has been around LTC in Canada for years. I was familiar with it before I retired to working in LTC in 2018. Note this 2013 report from Alberta: https://choosingwiselycanada.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/CWC_Antipsychotics_Toolkit_v1.0_2017-07-12.pdf
So, the issue predates MAID. I believe it is symptomatic of the overuse of prescription drugs among the general population. There are far too many doctors who are far too liberal in there use of drugs to “treat” problems. This situation in long-term care should come as no surprise. Although there are growing pressures to “off” the elderly, I doubt this is much of a driver for assisted suicide. It is more likely a “treatment” offered to reduce staff workload.
If you must place a loved one in LTC, find out what the physician’s philosophy of care and of use of medications is as part of your research – and advocate rigorously for a conservative approach.
Soylent Green…its whats for dinner!!!
Nursing homes these days tend to be dumping grounds for the elderly who, in turn, are looked after by a handful of under-qualified people.
Yes, there are some good homes with good caregivers. The above does not sound like those homes, though.
After the drugging, euthanasia. Like Iceland claimed to solve its Down’s Syndrome problem, Canada can solve its elderly problem by killing people off.
The “art” of politicians has always, at least partly, been to nudge people into asking for what it is you are selling them. In this case, it’s voluntary euthanasia. Stories such as this one and of Ontario potentially sending people into long term car hundreds of miles from their families and loved ones will only make the MAID numbers go up. I can tell you that it is working for me. No LTC home for me. EVER. Future generations will be expected to off themselves once their usefulness goes. It will be celebrated.
Shades of Logan’s Run.
Can I take antipsychotic drugs to make the PSYCHO’s running our society into the ground just GO AWAY!? Will the drugs make them shut up!? Seriously … give me the drugs if they will shut up people like Gavin Newsom and PM SocksinPussy
If I may paraphrase Col. Jessup from A Few Good Men:
“You weep for your sister Linda and you curse the LTC facilities. You have that luxury because you have off loaded the burden of caring for your demented sister to others. The treatment of your sister, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, is the best care care possible within the available budget The truth is that your sister could have had the finest care that money could buy. All you had to do was keep your sister at home and pony up the money for private nurses and other caregivers. But the truth is that you won’t do that. You want other people to pay for her “money-is-no-object long term care.” But you don’t want the truth because deep down in places you don’t talk about at parties, you don’t want to take care of your crazy sister. You and the rest of your family should have had a talk about the proper way to die before you got in this mess. I’ll bet you have never used the words honor and duty to govern the end of life healthcare. We accept the principle of dying for one’s country if one’s country is in jeopardy because it is one’s duty. And it is dishonorable to do otherwise. Well how about the duty to die for one’s family if one’s continued existence puts it in jeopardy? But Linda’s sister does not want to do her duty. Actually she probably thinks duty and honor are quaint anachronisms. But the taxpayers of this country should not have either the time or the inclination to explain themselves to irresponsible people who rise and sleep under the blanket of the very healthcare system that they provide, and then question the manner in which they provide it. Personally, I would rather you just said thank you, and went on your way, otherwise, I suggest you provide your own end of life healthcare at home and accept that burden. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you are entitled to.”
Excellent!
Well done.
Or you can just sign the paper and they will put you down like the dog you are..
All hail Thorazine!!!
Murder Inc at work.
PERIOD.
Canadians will still put their parents into the death house.
PP will do nothing except make it cheaper, as he’s really just a bean counter at heart.
Prove me wrong.
Clot shot must be underperforming on opening up vacant beds.
How else are they supposed to test those drugs?
You have no idea. Iv’e seen doctors using high-pressure sales tactics on heart-attack-victims to throw some new drug at them while they’re still bed-ridden. Kicked them outta my wife’s hospital room myself. She thanked me.
That was back in the early 2000s.
What’s the world coming to when even doctors have been corrupted.
SPAM!
EdPills and jasmin loutra loura
The symptoms described in the article would be best treated with a low dose of an anti-convulsant, but those are all off patent, and so not a huge waste of tax dollars like the antipsychotics.