Government to investigate nursing homes’ antipsychotic use

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is investigating nursing homes this month to verify whether antipsychotic medications are being given to people who are not schizophrenic. Over the past few decades, evidence has mounted that some nursing homes wrongly report patients as having schizophrenia so they can use antipsychotic medications to sedate them, reducing the amount of care they require.

Is this actually a problem? A government report last year found that in 2019, as many as 99 nursing homes reported 20 percent or more of their residents had schizophrenia, even when those residents had no corresponding diagnoses of the disorder.

Dig deeper: Read Ashley Vaughan’s report in WORLD Magazine about how overmedicating the body and mind while ignoring the soul can have dangerous side effects.