Antipsychotics

More than half of the prescriptions for antipsychotic drugs in the UK are being issued "off-label" to treat conditions other than those for which the drugs are approved, according to a large study published in the British Medical Journal Open. Researchers also found significantly higher levels of prescribing of the medications to poorer people.

Describing the prevalence and management of adverse effects from antipsychotics as "a neglected area" of study, a team of researchers from the UK has published a systematic review in the Journal of Psychopharmacology. They aimed to identify the prevalence of, and management strategies for nine categories of adverse effects, including sedation, weight gain, metabolic syndrome, sexual dysfunction and cardiovascular effects.

The US Food and Drug Administration is warning the public that the antipsychotic medication ziprasidone "is associated with a rare but serious skin reaction...

"Many patients with first-episode psychosis receive medications that do not comply with recommended guidelines for first-episode treatment," states a National Institute of Mental Health...

Common psychiatric medications double the risk of heart attack and triple the risk of stroke, according to research presented at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress...

"Pathological gambling, hypersexuality, compulsive shopping and other impulse control disorders were associated with the use of dopamine receptor agonists, often prescribed for Parkinson’s disease,...

Since the 1960s, the positive response rates to antipsychotic medications have been dropping steadily, according to a meta-analysis published in JAMA Psychiatry by Columbia...

It is very common for psychiatric patients, especially those diagnosed with schizophrenia, to be prescribed two or more psychiatric medications at once, and this...

Common second-generation antipsychotic medications are causing symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder to emerge in many people who previously only had schizophrenia symptoms, according to a...

The popular smoking cessation drug Chantix is the medication that most frequently makes people feel suicidal or homicidal, according to figures gathered by the...

The provincial government health service of Alberta, Canada recently concluded a successful pilot project that reduced the use of antipsychotic medications for patients with...

Use of second-generation antipsychotics (SGA) alongside other medications is growing rapidly among youth who are less impaired, according to a study published online in...

Taking the antipsychotic medication risperidone significantly increases men's chances of developing gynecomastia, or breast enlargement, according to a study by University of British Columbia...

Children as young as four in foster care are taking three or more psychotropic medications, and the length of time that children aged six...

Finnish reseachers report in Schizophrenia Research that antipsychotic use is associated with cognitive and memory impairments. The University of Oulu team studied forty people...

People diagnosed with schizophrenia experience reductions in brain volume that increase over time, and the amount of those reductions increases in proportion to the...

New Zealand and Chinese investigators believe they have clarified the mechanisms by which second generation antipsychotics cause serious "derangements" in glucose metabolism in the...

Nearly 90,000 American adults are going to emergency rooms every year in response to adverse events from psychiatric medications, according to a study in...

“Live, healthy babies are the most common outcome following the use of antipsychotic medication in pregnancy,” conclude Australian researchers in a study that was...

Martin Harrow's study tracing the effects of antipsychotics on 139 schizophrenia (SZ) and mood-disordered patients over 20 years, just published in Psychological Medicine, finds...

A paper by Joanna Moncrieff and Laura Allison in the journal History of Psychiatry reviews "the theory and practice of emergency sedation for behavioural...

Although cocaine and psychostimulant dependence are thought to be related to increased dopamine release, research from Tokyo and Long Island finds that the effect...

Research from London and Taipei finds that neuroleptic malignant syndrome (NMS) is associated with the number of different antipsychotics used (polypharmacy), rather than the overall...

The American Psychiatric Association, as part of the American Board of Internal Medicine's "Choosing Wisely" initiative, released new practice guidelines yesterday that advise against...

In a recent interview, Nancy Andreasen, former editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Psychiatry, reaffirmed her earlier findings that antipsychotics shrink brain tissue. "We spent a couple...