Drugs used to treat chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and other wellness problems potentially cause more harm than good to your wellbeing, and even threaten your life, but doctors are still prescribing them, and, up until now, there has been little information on how often the benzodiazepines are being prescribed, and to whom. However, a new study, published in Drugs and Aging, seeks to change that.
Benzodiazepines are used in COPD if your wellbeing is affected by certain symptoms, such as insomnia, depression, anxiety and shortness of breath, even though the drugs can cause potential respiratory-related side-effects. It is currently recommended, by the American Thoracic Society-European Respiratory Society guidelines, that if you have COPD, also known as emphysema or chronic bronchitis, you avoid using benzodiazepines because of this reason.
According to Dr Nicholas Vozoris, a respirologist at St. Michael’s Hospital and lead author of the study, ‘I see a large number of COPD patients taking this medication class to help relieve disease-related symptoms like insomnia, depression and anxiety, but considering the potential respiratory side-effects, and the well-documented neuro-cognitive side effects like memory loss, decreased alertness, falls and increased risk of motor vehicle accidents, the high frequency of benzodiazepine use in COPD is very concerning.’
This is why, between 2004 and 2009, his team evaluated the amount of benzodiazepines taken by over 100,000 Ontario adult-COPD patients over the age of 66, and how the severity of their COPD was affected while on the drug. The results were that benzodiazepine dispensing occurred in more than a third of the adults, and it was 40% more common for those with severed COPD to use the drug. Repeat prescriptions and early refills were also the most common among this group, whilst patients who were having flare-ups of the disease were also commonly dispensed benzodiazepines.
Dr Vozoris explained, ‘These findings are new and they are concerning because they tell us that the patients most at risk to be affected by the adverse effects of this drug are the same ones that are using it with the most frequency. This medication could be causing harm in this already respiratory-vulnerable population.’ He added, ‘Patients need to hear this and health care providers need to give thought into who they are prescribing this medication class to. We’re talking about a very vulnerable sub-group and we may be inappropriately prescribing this medication class to those patients.’
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