According to a major recent countrywide study, antipsychotic drugs that are prescribed for delusions, agitation or aggression have no effect in treating Alzheimer's disease as most of the patients discontinue the drugs due to the side effects.
This study was conducted by Lon Schneider, professor of psychiatry, neurology and gerontology and his team at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California (USC).The Phase I results from the Clinical Antipsychotic Trials of Intervention Effectiveness (CATIE) Alzheimer's Disease Study was published in this week's New England Journal of Medicine. The National Institutes of Mental Health funded this study.
The study is highly anticipated, because it provides the first long-term comparative look at the three major antipsychotic drugs now used
