Are the Elderly Being Dosed with Dangerous Antipsychotic Drugs?
Antipsychotic medication was the subject of a ¨black box¨ warning, issued by the FDA in 2005 and then again, in 2008. The warnings, which stated that the drugs should not be given to those over sixty years of age, was largely ignored by the elder care industry and by prescribing doctors. According to Psychiatry Online, “The prescribing labels of all antipsychotics are now required to carry a standard warning.”
“The boxed warning will say that elderly patients with dementia-related psychosis and treated with antipsychotics have an increased risk of death,” said Thomas Laughren, M.D., director of the Division of Psychiatry Products at the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, at a June 16 press conference. The revised labels were to be finalized within 30 days of the mandate.
The first round of black box warnings, in 2005, were aimed at second generation antipsychotics, atypical antipsychotics, such as Aripiprazole (Abilify), Asenapine (Saphris), Brexpiprazole (Rexulti), Cariprazine (Vraylar), Clozapine (Clozaril), Iloperidone (Fanapt), Lurasidone (Latuda), Olanzapine (Zyprexa), Paliperidone (Invega), and Quetiapine (Seroquel). The 2008 warning was extended to all antipsychotic medication, including first generation, including Chlorpromazine (Thorazine), Fluphenazine (Prolixin), Haloperidol (Haldol), Loxapine (Loxitane), Perphenazine (Trilafon), Pimozide (Orap), Thiothixene (Navane), and Trifluoperazine (Stelazine).
These “black box warnings” were issued due to acknowledgement of increased risk of death in the elderly who took these medications. According to an article in the British Medical Journal, published in 2024 https://www.bmj.com/content/385/bmj-2023-076268 ”The main outcomes were stroke, venous thromboembolism, myocardial infarction, heart failure, ventricular arrhythmia, fracture, pneumonia, and acute kidney injury, stratified by periods of antipsychotic use, with absolute risks calculated using cumulative incidence in antipsychotic users versus matched comparators. An unrelated (negative control) outcome of appendicitis and cholecystitis combined was also investigated to detect potential unmeasured confounding.”
In fact, the usefulness of antipsychotic medication to treat symptoms of aging has also been disputed. “Accelerated cognitive decline has been reported in elderly patients with dementia during treatment with conventional antipsychotic drugs.” (Reference McShane, Keene and GedlingMcShane et al, 1997). Unfortunately, this rather shocking conclusion has been swept under the rug and largely ignored.
According to a peer reviewed article in Dove Press, “Even if atypical antipsychotics have been potentially shown to cause serious cardiac and metabolic risks, they are still widely used. They became the top selling drug class in the US in 2008, edging out lipid regulator drugs and proton pump inhibitors.” https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4144926/
While there is anecdotal evidence that there has been a curtailment in prescribing these drugs to the elderly since that time , they appear to be prescribed liberally to the most vulnerable of the elderly, those under an adult guardianship, who have been stripped of their civil rights and have generally speaking lost the right of medical self-determination.
While the FDA pussyfooted around a media request for data relating to prevalence of use of these drugs in elderly populations, ultimately declining to provide information, the pattern of these drugs being prescribed to the guardianized is prevalent and of grave concern.
Hannah Shore’s mother, Debbie, suffered a heart attack in 2022, which resulted in what is termed an “anoxic brain injury.” She was only 66 at the time. In a subsequent court proceeding, she was put under guardianship with Midwest Care Management, ostensibly misdiagnosed as “schizophrenic,” and put on the atypical antipsychotic, Risperdal. Hannah was adamant that Risperdal be discontinued, due to its negative profile for people with heart problems and with diabetes. Hannah states that eventually Risperdal was discontinued. Nevertheless, her mother expired in late 2024. Hannah states that she believes the estate to be worth approximately $2 million.
Kathy Bosse’s mother went under guardianship in the state of Ohio in 2013, at the age of 82. Kathy reports that the “guardian resigned first, on her own, when she found out from the physician's office that I had the recent visit's records openly stating the mental decline was an adverse/allergic reaction to the antipsychotic. They filed to transfer the guardianship to another professional guardian. That is when we sibling's got together to prevent that and all agreed on a family member, which the court accepted. “
Her mother is now 93 and according to daughter, Kathy, is doing well. Kathy states that her mother was suffering under guardianship and that the “antipsychotics were making her worse.”
Kathy and her Mom are the lucky ones. It is considered to be most difficult to get a guardianship terminated or transferred to an adult child. According to an article covering Diane Dimond’s recent book on guardianship , We’re Here to Help: When Guardianship Goes Wrong, “It is nearly impossible for someone under guardianship to get out because they have been declared incapacitated. They no longer have civil rights. “
It was this perception which impelled Joanne Bougalis, a Marine veteran and licensed social worker, to flee the US with her mother, Katherine Bougalis, in May of 2016. While this reporter is aware that multiple parties—adult children of the guardianized—have often faced arrest and extradition for so doing, Bougalis successfully got her mother out and resettled in Greece. She reports that her mother was being dosed with the atypical antipsychotic, Seroquel, as well as with Ativan, ostensibly to subdue her.
Bougalis has sent this reporter a number of medical records relevant to her mother’s status. One can see clearly where a diagnosis, negative for dementia in 2014 became rather suddenly a diagnosis of dementia at the very tme that the guardianship was initiated and a new medical professional was inserted. Bougalis has successfully petitioned the court in Greece for guardianship over her mother, while strangely the prior guardianship in Minnesota continues unabated, with the prior guardian in charge of significant funds and still seeking Joanne’s arrest. Joanne is hopeful that at an upcoming hearing in April, a new judge assigned to the case, Robert Friday, will take the matter by the horns, terminate the stateside guardianship and release the funds to Bougalis in Greece. According to Joanne, the estate was valued at around $6 million at the time of initiation of the guardianship. Joanne has stated that the MN guardian, while paying himself, has refused to provide any funds whatsoever to Katherine in the past 9 years for her basic needs.
Ginny Johnson’s father, Hugh Johnson, was one day playing golf at his favorite golf course in Raleigh, North Carolina and the very next day slapped with a guardianship which would destroy his life. Ginny was living with her father and taking care of him prior to the initiation of the guardianship, which resulted in her father being transferred to a facility named “Covington.” Johnson declares that “There are large amounts of misappropriation of funds, financial damages, and familial loss of my dad “ via the guardianship. Her perusal of the medical records related to the treatment of her father, a WWII veteran, reveals that he was also dosed with antipsychotic medication, reporting that her father was given Seroquel and then Haldol.
Johnson expired quickly under guardianship, which his daughter reports was launched in February of 2011. Hugh Johnson died in June of 2012. In an affidavit dated 2017, Ginny Johnson lists the following acts of financial concern and more --
“Linda Johnson made close to 60 thousand off the estate. Aging Family Service approx.$100 thousand from the estate.
(45) The truth of this story is Linda Funke Johnson, the court appointed guardian (no relation) and Aging Family Services-Lied, cheated, and master minded fraud to the Ward Hugh Beverley Johnson life, and to his estate.
(A) Hugh Beverley Johnson home did not need to be sold. He was a healthy 95 year old who, lifted weights and road a bike and golfed. He lived at his million plus dollar eating 3 meals a day, cooked by daughter Ginny Johnson, who had full Power of Attorney and Power of Medical. Before the improper proceedings, Linda F Johnson, not only failed to do her fiduciary duties, she lied to the court, to sell his home for her profit, because his VA benefits were paid in full, to include all Medical and nursing home’s needs, if needed; because He was WWII decorated Hero Veteran shot down and was a POW and MIA. Linda Johnson lied to move him out of the comforts of his home and move Ginny his daughter, too, to sell their home, for her profit. There was no need for Linda Johnson to hire a sitter for the “Ward” at any time, when his daughter Ginny was taking care of all his needs if any, but Linda Johnson decided to isolate Ginny, his daughter, to spend unnecessary money for the Ward to have a sitter- guardian Linda Johnson, makes money if she write “checks” out of the Wards Estate.
(B) Linda Johnson paid off a million dollar debt that was NOT, the Wards debt and left the estate broker
(C) Linda Johnson used SS money and VA money for her profit- and took away a joint bank account Ginny and her father had, and put it in her name and bank.
(D) Linda Johnson falsified document to the VA and to Medicare/ and isolated Wards doctor of 40 plus years. She also put the his home in her name and defrauded the court with many false documents.
(E) Linda Johnson and Aging Family Services and Nursing home of their choice not family – work together to chemically restrain Ward – (call slip them a mickey) to SHUT them UP – because they are NOT incompetent. Upon request I have medical records except from VA.”
Muriel Frank, of Florida, had provided her daughter, Alicia, the Power of Attorney. Alicia was also the legal recipient of her mother’s home on her eventual passing, via a “ladybird deed” executed on June 19, 2020. Upon initiation of her mother’s guardianship, however, the legal landscape altered drastically. The court ignored the Trust and other legal documents. Alicia was subsequently evicted from her mother’s home and the court overrode the legal documents already in place, approving the sale of her mother’s home to a family member.
Alicia has provided proof that her mother, a former high school math teacher, has been dosed with the antipsychotic medication, Quetiapine. She questions whether or not her mother’s current mental status, which she describes as “in and out of reality,” is a product of that medication. She has appealed to the court to stop the medical abuse of her mother, abuse that is evidenced not only by the use of the antipsychotic drug, in the face of the black box warning, but also by the current practice of forcing Muriel to evacuate her bowels in her pants, denying her access to the commode.
The attorney for the guardian, Madeline Medoff, responded in writing, denying that Muriel was on the antipsychotic drug, writing that “Muriel is not on Quetiapine/Seroquel. The first hospice company in place (Trustbriddge Hospice) ordered it and was filled by the pharmacy, however it was never given to Muriel. Any medications that Muriel is taking, is by and through the recommendations of the healthcare professionals who care for her.”
Finally, it is worth noting that the individual whom this reporter has been trying to advocate for, and whose waiver granting me access to his medical records has been not only ignored by the assisted living facility in California but has also resulted in a prosecution by the state of California and a subsequent restraining order https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2025-03-13/lawfare-deployed-against-thos… –(although I have never been legally served with the petition nor with the order after hearing)--that this individual, even though he repeatedly and consistently denies hallucinations, which are a prime indicator of the diagnosis of schizophrenia—is being dosed with the antipsychotic Zyprexa. The individual is well over sixty years of age and is therefore included in those who should not be given this drug, according to the FDA black box warning.
In closing, all this discussion of black box warnings might be summarized as follows—These drugs kill older people. The fact that this is officially recognized yet these drugs are still prescribed to the most vulnerable of all, those who have lost the right to medical self-determination, points in the direction of intentionality. To be utterly clear, it appears that these drugs are intended to kill and the brave new world we inhabit simply has no room for the old.
But is much too nice, or maybe just too self protective, to say so.