Explain Why When Antipsychotic Drugs Are Prescribed To Dementia
506 Words3 Pages
1.) Antipsychotic drugs are drugs that alter someone’s mood or behavior, to subdue them or lessen their agitation. Antipsychotic drugs are given to dementia patients for a number of reasons. One of these reasons being, the dementia patient might be “difficult” to work with. “Difficult” to work with might mean that they are resistive to some cares or staff, they might hit, bit, or kick, and sometimes the “difficult” patient might be labeled as the person who keeps trying to leave to go home. Another reason that someone with dementia might be put on these antipsychotic drugs is because they wonder in and out of other peoples rooms, taking things that don’t belong to them. Also, dementia patients are being given these horrible antipsychotic drugs simply because there is not enough staff to properly take care of these people who are suffering from horrible diseases.…show more content… One of the risk factors that comes into play from being on this medication is: developing seizures, people whom have never had seizures in their life time will be put on this medication and they will start having seizures. Along with seizures, strokes are also a risk factor of these medications, but the worst risk factor of all is death. Antipsychotic drugs triple the risk of death in dementia patients that are prescribed these medications. Some of the side effects include but are not limited to: being sedated, almost to the point of comatose, sleepy, mumbled words, scrambled thoughts, trouble focusing, balancing troubles- leading to falls, and the list goes