New
Service for TodaysSeniorsNetwork.com
readers...roll mouse over, click on
highlighted links in stories to review items
from Amazon
Now, keep up to date
with daily feeds of newly posted stories
about America's Seniors...click on the box
to the left
Using
Anticholinergic Drugs may increase Cognitive
Decline in Older People
Newswise —
Anticholinergic drugs, such as medicines for
stomach cramps, ulcers, motion sickness, and
urinary incontinence, may cause older people
to experience greater decline in their
thinking skills than people not taking the
drugs, according to research that will be
presented at the American Academy of
Neurology 60th Anniversary Annual Meeting in
Chicago.
The study looked at the
effects of taking a medication with
anticholinergic properties on the annual
change in thinking abilities of 870 Catholic
nuns and clergy members who were an average
of 75 years old.
All of the participants
were part of the Rush Religious Orders
Study, an ongoing, longitudinal, clinical
study of older people without dementia.
All of the participants
underwent annual cognitive tests and
reported their medication use for an average
follow up period of eight years. During the
study, 679 people took at least one
medication with anticholinergic properties.
The study found those
people who took anticholinergic drugs saw
their rate of cognitive function decline 1.5
times as fast as those people who did not
take the drugs.
“Our findings point to
anticholinergic drugs having an adverse
impact on cognitive performance in otherwise
normal, older people,” said study author
Jack Tsao, MD, DPhil, Associate Professor of
Neurology at Uniformed Services University
in Bethesda, Maryland, and member of the
American Academy of Neurology. “Doctors may
need to take this into account before
prescribing these commonly used drugs.”
Tsao says more research
is needed to determine the mechanism behind
the rapid memory loss apparently associated
with anticholinergic drugs and to identify
which drugs, in particular, may be more
likely to impair cognition.
The study was supported
by the American Philosophical Society Daland
Grant and grants from the National Institute
on Aging.
The American Academy of
Neurology, an association of over 21,000
neurologists and neuroscience professionals,
is dedicated to improving patient care
through education and research. A
neurologist is a doctor with specialized
training in diagnosing, treating and
managing disorders of the brain and nervous
system such as Alzheimer’s disease,
epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s
disease, and stroke.
For more information
about the American Academy of Neurology,
visit
http://www.aan.com.
...
...
...