Sleeping pills for the elderly: are they ever justified?
Sleep disturbances in the elderly are common but not trivial. They are almost always multiply determined by age-dependent changes in sleep (amount, composition, and circadian distribution), concurrent medical/neuropsychiatric disorders and their treatments, and psychosocial/environmental changes. Against this complex background, the widespread use of sleeping pills to treat insomnia in the elderly is inadequate and--because of delay in diagnosis, adverse effects on respiration during sleep, and impairment of daytime alertness--potentially dangerous. A more thoughtful, less reflexive, approach to the prescription of sleeping pills in the elderly is suggested.
D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D001288:Attention; D002940:Circadian Rhythm; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D011307:Drug Prescriptions / Q000592:standards; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006993:Hypnotics and Sedatives / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D008297:Male; D012119:Respiration / Q000187:drug effects; D007319:Sleep Initiation and Maintenance Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000209:etiology; D012893:Sleep Wake Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000209:etiology
D006993:Hypnotics and Sedatives