According to the New York Times (10/15, Gebeloff) “The Upshot,” a push in 2012 on the part of the US government to decrease unneeded antipsychotic medication “use in nursing homes included an exemption for residents with schizophrenia,” and experts indicate that a number of facilities are utilizing the exemption “to continue sedating” patients with dementia rather than “providing the more costly, staff-intensive care that regulators are trying to promote.” According to a study published online Sept. 30 in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, this has affected Black residents more severely. The Times added, “Since the new rules went into place, Black Americans with dementia have been 1.7 times as likely as their white nursing home neighbors to be diagnosed with schizophrenia, said Shekinah A. Fashaw-Walters, a public health researcher at the University of Minnesota and the study’s lead author.”
Related Links:
— “A Racial Disparity in Schizophrenia Diagnoses in Nursing Homes “Robert Gebeloff, The New York Times, October 15, 2021