[rx, sci/bio/med] Oh, hell: Fwd: Common drugs strongly linked to increased dementia risk

[siderea]

(h/t SlateStarCodex)

The Harvard Health Blog (of, yes, Harvard Medical School) posted on Jan 28: Common anticholinergic drugs like Benadryl linked to increased dementia risk [...] A report published online this week in JAMA Internal Medicine offers compelling evidence of a link between long-term use of anticholinergic medications like Benadryl

Comments

[anonymous]

I've been taking a low dose of amitriptyline for years because it's supposed to help with IBS. I'm not sure it's really helping, and now I think I need to quit it entirely, cold turkey?

(Comment posted anonymously because this is a public post. I'd like to tell you who I am, though.)

[siderea]

If you're an LJ user, you can PM me, if that is adequately secure for you.

In any event: talk to your MD.

[heron61]

Well hell, every allergy medication I've ever taken is in the 3 category. Now I need to find something that works that isn't :(

[ckd]

Urgh.

The good news is that my standard antihistamine is fexofenadine (which is listed as "studied but not added" in that PDF), and of my other regular meds only one's on the list and it's a 1-point; still worth asking about (and I will), but less worrisome than a 3-pointer would be.

The bad news is that sometimes it doesn't do enough, and I've tended to use Benadryl as an add-on in those cases. Well, that's stopping.

[livredor]

This isn't in any way comforting, but while you're worrying about anticholinergics, have you seen this research on benzos and Z drugs? Double all-causes mortality long term for people who take anything based on benzodiazepines compared to people with similar medical histories who don't take those drugs, in a big cohort study. I'm thinking you probably have a fair number of patients prescribed these things, too.

[siderea]

Oh, hey, no, I hadn't. I had managed to stumble across this article about benzos and dementia.

*deepsigh*

[mortuus]

Hmm, an antihistamine I take is on the "possible anticholinergic" list, but there's no way I'm stopping it. (There is one alternative drug that also works, but it's on the same list.) If my option is a slightly higher chance of dementia or spending every day covered head to toe with hives, I'm taking door number 1.

Unfortunate, though.