13.9% Of 65+ Medicare Beneficiaries Have Prescriptions For 2+ Psychotropic Medications

In 2018, 13.9% of older adults with dementia in the U.S. filled two or more prescriptions for psychotropic medications that affect the central nervous system (CNS). This equaled a total of 32,139,610 person-days of exposure (polypharmacy-days) to CNS polypharmacy. CNS-active polypharmacy is defined as prescription fills for three or more medications from the following drug classes: antidepressants, antipsychotics, antiepileptics, benzodiazepines, nonbenzodiazepine benzodiazepine receptor agonist hypnotics, and opioids.

Of those individuals with CNS-active polypharmacy, the median number of polypharmacy-days was 193. About 57.8% were exposed for longer than 180 days, and . . .