Loading...
Because of the cognitive adverse effects of benzodiazepines, the hypnotic nonbenzodiazepine “Z-drugs,” and other anxiolytics, concerns have grown about their potential contributions to dementia, especially among high-risk patients with affective disorders. To examine this question, investigators used Danish national health registries involving 235,465 patients who first received a hospital-contact diagnosis of an affective disorder between 1996 and 2015.
Almost all patients had depressive disorders (manic or bipolar disorder, 6%). Overall, 76% received one or more prescriptions for benzodiazepines (64%), Z-drugs (55%), or other anxiolytics (13%), and 9776 (4.2%) were subsequently thought to have dementia, based on hospital diagnosis or presc…