Psychotropic Drug Use in the Elderly Living in Nursing Homes - Associations With Clinical Symptoms and the Influence of a Structured Drug Review

Norwegian national guidelines recommend a very cautious use of psychotropic drugs in the elderly, especially for treating dementia-related symptoms. These drugs should be used at a very low dosage and for as short a time as possible. Despite these strict guidelines, patients with and without dementia living in nursing homes still receive a high amount of psychotropic drugs. Thus, there should be a higher focus on lowering the use of psychotropic medications in nursing homes. A reduction of prescription of potential harmful and inappropriate drugs for the elderly may improve the clinical symptoms of the patients, reduce the interaction between drugs and the side-effects, and thereby improving the quality of life of the patients.

In 2018 the Norwegian Institute of Public Health updated a report about the general health in the Norwegian elderly population. This report shows that prescription rates for the majority of drugs in the population above 65 years of age have increased in the past 11 years. Unfortunately, Norway does not have a prescription registry for patients living in nursing homes and according to the same report the drug use and the increase of prescription rates in nursing homes is underestimated. During the last years Norwegian authorities, media and user organizations have shown a particular interest in this subject, showing how clinical practice still differs from national and international guidelines, and focusing on the severity of polypharmacy in the elderly living in institutions, particularly concerning patients with dementia receiving psychotropic drugs.

As a result of missing data concerning the real use and increase of drug prescriptions in nursing homes, our study will keep exploring the psychotropic drug use in the elderly population living in Norwegian nursing homes, and it will increase the knowledge about risk factors associated to higher prescription rates. The effect of structured reviews with NorGeP is understudied, and the proposed randomized controlled trial could therefore add valuable knowledge to the field, by exploring how specific training for health personnel working in nursing homes will affect drug prescription in the future.