Advocacy Group Wants to Fight Illinois Nursing Home Abuse with Tougher Rules on the Use of Anti-Psychotic Drugs as Chemical Restraints
A nursing home resident advocates group, Illinois Citizens for Better Care, wants the state to impose tougher laws and rules regarding the use of anti-psychotic drugs on elderly residents as chemical restraints. According to the Chicago Tribune, there are many nursing home patients who are being harmed because of they were administered these powerful drugs.
While the Food and Drug Administration has approved anti-psychotic meds to treat schizophrenia and other mental illnesses, doctors can prescribe these drugs for “off-label” use. This can prove fatal, as evidenced by the deaths of three nursing home patients who were chemically restrained. The nursing home director at the assisted living facility is accused of over-drugging residents that annoyed her. Some of the patients were forced down so they could be chemically sedated. Elder abuse charges have been filed.
It is wrong to restrain a nursing home resident as a form of punishment or as a cost cutting measure. There are strict guidelines that a nursing home must abide by to determine when any kind of restraint is appropriate.
According to a recent study, about 144,000 dementia patients are given anti-psychotic drugs without just cause in the United Kingdom. Over-drugging kills about 1,800 elderly patients and nearly as many stroke victims. In the United States, the FDA attributes approximately 15,000 nursing home fatalities to unnecessary antipsychotics.
Our Chicago, Illinois nursing home negligence lawyers do not tolerate abuse of any kind. We are known throughout DuPage County, Cook County, Will County, and Lake County for helping nursing home victims and their families obtain financial recovery from negligent nursing homes.
Tighter rules sought for anti-psychotic drug use in nursing homes, Chicago Tribune, December 20, 2009
Chemical restraints killing dementia patients, Guardian.co.UK, November 12, 2009
Related Web Resources:
Illinois Citizens for Better Care
