Dementia patients` care givers to be trained on drug therapy

New Delhi: After a study found that compliance to drugs is poor among dementia patients, a government hospital here has initiated a programme to made the the care givers aware about right dosages of drugs and their side-affects.

Under the programme launched by Ram Manohar Hospital, the care givers of the patients will be trained for adequate monitoring and judicious use of medicines by dementia patients. They will be trained about the dosages of drugs, their duration, follow up and warning signs when a patient is on some drug. The course aims to spread awareness amongst care givers about proper drug therapy by reducing the number of medications and taking them on time. "It has come to our notice that compliance to drugs is poor among dementia patients due to a high incidence of polytherapy (use of multiple medications by a patient). Higher is the numbers of medicines, poorer is the compliance," said Dr Vikas Dikhav, a senior research officer in the department of neurology at the hospital and the coordinator of the programme. A study recently conducted by the hospital on 143 patients, two third of whom were men having a mean duration of dementia for more than five years and were on polytherapy, found that more than half of the patients were not able to take medicines as directed because of poor education about medicines, literacy and forgetfulness. "Being on multiple drugs is a risk factor for poor compliance amongst elderly. Simplifying drug treatment, reducing number of drugs per patient, adequate supervision and monitoring associated with good patient and care giver education can help solve the problem," Dr Dikhav added. PTI