Australia's problem with obtaining consent for psychotropic use in older people

Carmelle Peisah; Tiffany Jessop

doi:10.1111/imj.15274

Australia's problem with obtaining consent for psychotropic use in older people

Intern Med J. 2021 Apr;51(4):604-607. doi: 10.1111/imj.15274.

Authors

Carmelle Peisah^{1

2

3}, Tiffany Jessop^{1

4}

Affiliations

¹ Capacity Australia, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
² Department of the School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
³ Old Age and Consultant Liaison Psychiatry, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
⁴ Dementia Centre for Research Collaboration, UNSW Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

PMID: 33890367
DOI: 10.1111/imj.15274

Abstract

Frequent use of psychotropic medicines in people with dementia is a significant concern globally, doing this without informed consent is a violation of human rights, ethics and law. Capacity Australia piloted an intervention to address several hypothetical barriers to obtaining consent for psychotropic use in aged care and has developed a suite of resources to improve rights and health literacy for clinicians, patients and community alike.

Keywords: consent; dementia; human rights; psychotropic.

MeSH terms

Aged
Australia / epidemiology
Humans
Informed Consent*

Grants and funding

Australian Government, Dementia and Aged Care Services (DACS) grants fund