Half of all nursing home residents in Britain are being wrongly drugged, a new study suggests, twice as many as previously thought.

Half of nursing home residents wrongly drugged, study shows
Article in the Telegraph

Extracts:

"Experts who looked at 22 nursing homes found 51 per cent of residents were being inappropriately given drugs, including anti-psychotics, antidepressants and painkillers."

"Paul Burstow, the Liberal Democrat MP, said: “This adds to the growing evidence that inappropriate medicating in care homes is much more routine in practice than we would like to believe.

“And when it comes to the prescribing of anti-psychotics, these drugs are actually killing people. The Government must come up with concrete proposals to crack down on this problem.”

Mr Burstow has previously called for GPs who overprescribe to patients in homes to face prosecution.

The use of anti-psychotics has become increasingly controversial in recent years after they were linked to strokes. A report released last year suggested that the drugs could be responsible for more than 23,000 deaths in care homes every year."

Why is it OK for doctors and co. to be allowed to harm elderly people with impunity? - It would only need one or two of them to be prosecuted for bodily harm or whatever is the appropriate charge, and one or two of them going to prison if found guilty, and this scandalous, cruel abuse of power would stop.