Journal Selection
My journal of choice is the Journal of advanced Nursing . This is a peer-reviewed journal with massive traffic; it is popular for publishing nursing articles and is acclaimed for massing traffic and audience. It allows for subscription by interested contributors and offers a useful guideline manual that is much necessary to new writers. To submit a nursing scholarly article one is required to create a new account in their site; then you will be provided with a user ID and a password that you can use to access their site. There are tutorials for the new users and an option for authors to have their articles freely available for accessed by the audience. After articles are approved and published in the Journal, authors have the privilege of reposting them elsewhere; the journal will also share them in PubMed and PMC sites. The author will have full copyright of their work and will be issued with a compliance license. The authors are also provided with samples of articles that publish in this site.
Abstract
Background and problem statement: The prescribing of psychotropic medication to older adults has been very prevalent. This medication has been excessively administered to the older population with aim of managing behavior psychiatric symptoms. The widespread use is common in nursing homes and even to community dwelling patients. Its evident nurses have varying knowledge of this medication; there has been excessive and sometimes inappropriate prescribing of this disease. There are numerous risk factors that are associated with excessive administration of psychotropic medication (Lindsey, 2012).
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Purpose: The purpose of this project is to show (a) the common forms of psychotropic medication (b) the prevalent of the medications (c) the risk factors of excessive psychotropic medication to elder people (d) impacts of this phenomenon to the nursing profession.
Research questions:
What are the available forms of psychotropic medications?
How prevalent is the psychotropic medication?
Who is it administered to and what is its purpose?
What are the effects of excessively administering the medication to elderly adults?
What is its impact to the nursing profession?
Hypothesis: The aim of this paper is to test the prevalence of psychotropic medication and its implication when excessively administered to older adults. If the nurses have varying knowledge, and sometimes limited, then there might be risks arising to the population being cared for.
Method: This research project utilizes online search and analyzing of past researches on the topic. It’s basically a descriptive research using secondary data to explore on psychotropic medication. Mostly the peer reviewed articles published form the period of 2013 and 2017 was used for this research. The research entailed searching through the internet about Excessive use of psychotropic medicine and its implication then analyzing the results to come up with a conclusive result.
Results: The research has shown that psychotropic medication is excessively used by nurses to help manage cases of anxiety, insomnia, depression and psychological disorder. However inappropriate prescription is occurring frequently and exposing patients to health risks. Patients have shown incidences of addiction, cognitive decline and failed body functioning. There are actually more health risks than benefits when medication is administered excessively or inappropriately.
Conclusion: The prescription and administering of psychotropic medication by nurses is rampant. The nurses need to do thorough research of it and the associated risks incase its inappropriately administered and come up with ways they can implement to avoid overuse or excessive administration.
Forms of Psychotropic Medications
When elderly patients are having anxiety symptoms they are most likely to be prescribed with Benzodiazepines. The most popular Benzodiazepines are the Alprazolam, Lorazepam, Clonazepam, diazepam, and temazepam. They are prescribing for treating insomnia and anxiety; they are known to improve the quality of sleep. However, long term use is discouraged, as they can have far reaching health risks. Hypnotic medication is also commonly prescribed for patients with insomnia (Lindsey, 2012). These drugs are available as Zolpidem, Zaleplon, eszopliclone trzodone, nortriptyline, temazepam and gabapentin. They are meant to improve sleep and curb anxiety.
Elderly patients are also treated with Antipsychotics, it prevalently used in nursing homes it is administered to patients with aggressive behavior as well as those suffering from Alzheimer and dementia. Antidepressants are also commonly prescribed; community based elderly people are more prone to utilize this medication. There are incidences of overuse of this medication as it’s used to moderate pain, and curb anxiety (Curkovic et al. 2016).
Prevalent Is the Psychotropic Medication and the Intended Patients
The Psychotropic medication has been quite prevalent from around 1980’s; it is commonly used at home based setting to curb psychological disorders and symptoms which might include aggressive behaviors, anxiety, insomnia and other associated behaviors. Psychotropic medication are the drugs that known to alter chemical levels in the brain and mood and behavioral changes; they stabilize behaviors reduce depression and curb anxiety. In America the use of these drugs was very prevalent and somewhat inappropriate that in the 80’s, the federal government placed limitations on its use on nursing homes and other healthcare settings (Curkovic et al. 2016). Despite the regulation efforts, the use of the drugs typically increased as medics classified it as safe medication.
Effects Of Excessively Use Of Psychotropic Medication to Elderly Population
Excessive use of psychotropic drugs has been rampant in varying health settings. There are numerous risks associated with overuse of these drugs. Researchers have shown that most of the medicines used as antidepressant for older patients are addictive. They are not supposed to be overused for a prolonged duration. Elderly patients who have been exposed to overuse of benzodiazepines are at risk of experiencing falls which can result in fractures and other complications. Antipsychotic drugs are reported to cause the risk of hip fractures to older adults who have dementia. Long term use of such drugs can substantially increase the risk of hip fracture. The falls and fracture are with tricyclic antidepressant medicines and are associated with sedation, postural hypertension and psychomotor retardation effects. This might also lead to poor vision capability (Curkovic et al. 2016). Older adults who are under excessive use of psychotropic medicines also show risk of cerebrovascular events and ischemic stroke. Older patients are further prone to risk of increased pulmonary embolism. These risks are heightened by use of sedatives, hypnotics, opioids and antidepressants.
According to Curkovic, (2015) long term use of antipsychotics can lead to disruptive behavior on the patients. This is common especially to patients who portray aggressive behaviors. Excessive use of psychotropic medication has incre4ased the risk of mortality among users. Patients who have been prescribed with haloperidol or quetiapine are at risk of increased mortality. The effects of this drug are strongest immediately after initiation of drugs. The risk of mortality is almost double on the patients using psychotropic medication over those who are not on the medication. Conventional antipsychotics administered at nursing home setting especially to patients with dementia and are reported to cause more incidences of death.
Long exposure to anxiolytic drugs cause problems with sedation, memory and psychomotor impairment. Benzodiazepines are also known to cause paradoxical excitement when used in excess; they also may cause risk of cognitive decline and addiction. Additionally it has been proven to be a trigger for poor functional autonomy. These drugs are frequently used to reduce cases of insomnia but eventually interfere with sleep patterns in older adult patients. Extended use of sedating medicine might cause effects such as delirium and anti-cholinergic events (Curkovic et al. 2016). Antidepressants are not recommended for use over a long duration as they can cause gastrointestinal disturbances and sexual dysfunctional in older patients. In short-term their use can cause headaches and excessive sweating.
Results and Impact to Nursing Profession
The knowledge of how to avoid excessive use of psychotropic medicines is useful in saving lives and improving health of such patients. There is a need of nursing practitioners to implement new guidelines that impact on the importance of proper dosage and duration of medication. Nurses also need to exercise dosage reduction and tapering in case of risks. The nurses need to be offered proper training and experience in order to effectively attend to patients with mental problems and related disorders (Lindsey, 2012). Most of the nurses are reported to be unaware of side effects that are brought by excessive administering of psychotropic disease to patients. Nurses should also be able to identify elderly patients with depressive symptoms. When prescribing drugs they should be familiar with its category and possible side effects. People can also consider going for alternative or complementary available therapies like the prayer, massage, and aromatherapy. Other probable useful therapies that can be implemented include interpersonal, cognitive-behavioral therapy and the supportive psychotherapy
The effects of excessive use of psychotropic medicines is life threatening. It can lead to incidences of falling, impairment, skeletal fractures, addictions and complicated heath issues. The nurses have the role to help the patients use these drugs appropriately. This research acts as a call for nurses to administer the medicine in most appropriate dosage; when this is done there will be minimal health risks on the patients. Therefore this research project needs to be implemented accordingly by nurses to help treat elderly patients suffering from dementia and other mental related ailments more safely.
References
Curkovic M., et al. (2016) Psychotropic Medications In Older Adults: A Review. Psychiatria Danubina . Vol. 28, retrieved from http://www.hdbp.org/psychiatria_danubina/pdf/dnb_vol28_no1/dnb_vol28_no1_13. Pdf
Lindsey P., (2012) Psychotropic medication use among older adults: What all nurses need to know. National center for biotechnology information. Us national library of medicine retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3128509/
