Shocking Facility Elder Abuse Caught on Tape

'Off label' antipsychotic use drives up costs, sparks concern

(NEWSER) - Understaffed US nursing homes are increasingly turning to antipsychotic drugs to control elderly residents, even though most display symptoms of dementia rather than the psychotic disorders the drugs are intended to treat, the Wall Street Journal reports. Such “off-label” usage defies FDA warnings that elderly patients using the drugs face an increased risk of death. More»

(NEWSER) - Brooke Astor spent her final years in a haze as her faculties deserted her, her butler testified yesterday at the fraud trial of Astor’s son Anthony Marshall. As early as 1997, Astor’s memory started to fail her, leaving her unable to recall her servants’ names or even what a squirrel was, the New York Daily News reports. “She would point out the window and ask, ‘What animal is that?’” recalled Chris Ely. More»

Enquirer accused of looking for scoop

(NEWSER) - An outraged Brooke Shields says a pair of tabloid reporters hungry for a story checked her mother, a dementia sufferer, out of a nursing home earlier this week, People reports. Shields says police informed her that two National Enquirer reporters posing as her mother's friends signed her out of the facility. Teri Shields, 75, was later found talking to a reporter at a nearby restaurant. More»

Dementia research finds even brief use is dangerous

(NEWSER) - Elderly dementia patients given antipsychotic drugs, even briefly, are three times as likely to end up hospitalized or dead within a month, new research has found. The study looked at 40,000 elderly Canadians, half of them in nursing homes, and found that the drugs increased the risk of heart problems, pneumonia, and falls, Reuters reports. More»

Frontotemporal dementia strikes early and fast

(NEWSER) - A little-known form of dementia can turn sufferers into completely different people, leaving spouses and children struggling to cope with someone who's still there in body but not in mind. Frontotemporal dementia bears some similarities to Alzheimer's—but it can hit patients who are younger and it develops faster. The New York Times tells a tragic and touching story of one couple brought to the brink of divorce before Michael French was diagnosed with the disorder; now, Ruth French has devoted her life to caring for a man who can no longer speak. More»