QUALYOP project 2: monitoring the dismantling of Italian psychiatric hospitals. Psychotropic drug use in 1072 inpatients

Objective: This study describes the use of psychotropic drugs in a sample of eight Italian psychiatric hospitals.

Methods: A cross-sectional approach was used to collect information about sociodemographic and clinical characteristics of the inpatient population, and about medications prescribed. Prescribing behaviour in the hospitals was compared using three indicators: the number of patients taking psychotropic drugs, the use of high doses of neuroleptics and the use of multiple neuroleptics.

Results: More than a thousand patients were resident in the eight hospitals on the census day, 56% of them males. Half the population had an ICD-X diagnosis of schizophrenia, one third of mental retardation. Sixty-nine percent of the sample was on neuroleptic therapy, nearly 47% on benzodiazepines and 4% on antidepressants. Twenty percent of the sample did not take any psychotropic drug on the census day. After adjustment for sociodemographic and clinical variables, setting-related variables resulted as determinants of psychotropic drug use.

Conclusions: These data call for continuing education in psychopharmacology towards a more rational use of drugs; longitudinal audits of clinical practice should be implemented to guide clinicians toward a more rational use of psychotropic drugs.