Abstract
Psychotropic medications are known to cause a heightened risk of significant adverse effects in the geriatric population, including falls, hip fractures, delirium, and over-sedation. Geriatric patients may experience these and other adverse effects due to altered pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics, which must be considered when prescribing or changing regimens. The aged are also more likely to be prescribed multiple medications due to concurrent illnesses, with a higher risk of medication-related problems. Strategies are offered for switching, tapering, and cross-tapering of psychotropics to enhance efficacy and to minimize discontinuation syndromes and other adverse effects.
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Kozyra, E., Lau, T. (2019). Medication Strategies: Switching, Tapering, Cross-Over, Overmedication, Drug-Drug Interactions, and Discontinuation Syndromes. In: Fenn, H., Hategan, A., Bourgeois, J. (eds) Inpatient Geriatric Psychiatry . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10401-6_17
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10401-6_17
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