Is the price too much to pay?

The most commonly used prescription drugs on the market are antidepressants. In America, approximately 5% of males and 11% of females are taking antidepressants to treat their depression and eliminate suicidal thoughts.

Some commonly used antidepressant medications including Prozac

When taking any prescription drugs, a side effect commonly listed is weight gain. This is extremely prominent in antidepressants. The drug mianserin is contained in all antidepressants and has been proven to significantly increase appetite and body mass in users. This leads to more unwanted fat in the body, which can result in obesity, and thus lower the life expectancy. Although there is a definite reduction in life expectancy, the actual amount of time has yet to be determined.

That being said, depression is a serious problem and needs to be treated. Taking antidepressants to alleviate the suicidal thoughts and depression must be done, but it comes down to what is more important: feeling better about yourself and losing a few years of life, or being sad and depressed all the time and living a few years longer.

Prescription Drug Abuse

This week, I was browsing the wonderful world of Facebook and I came across a kid that I went to high school with. He had just gotten back from rehab. It hit me really hard to know that someone that I actually knew had used drugs so much that he had to go to rehab because I only hear about that in the tabloids. That got me thinking about how prescription drug abuse is a major cause of death and adverse side effects.

Annually, there are approximately 9 million people that are using prescription drugs for non-medical purposes. Between 1995 and 2002, the percent increase of emergency-room visits tied to abuse of prescription drugs was 163%.

Use of prescription drugs for non-medical purposes in 1999

Use of prescription drugs for non-medical purposes in 2003.

The bottom graph just goes to show that the use of prescription drugs for non-medical purposes is increasing as time goes on.

 Quick fact: legal drugs are responsible for the most deaths attributed to drugs. More than cocaine, heroine, and all other combinations of illegal drugs.

Well how does this relate to aging? Well, if you just take a brief moment to think about how you can die if you overdose of prescription drugs, then you will realize that there is no aging process. The fact is: if you die of overdosing from any kind of drug, there is no way to determine the effects of your body later in life, because you will not have a later life.

The Beers List

The Beers list could contain the following: Heineken, Coors, Miller Light, and even Budweiser. However, the Beers list that I would much rather focus on looks more like Hyoscyamine,
Clonidine, Oxybutynin, with a little hint of Metaclopramide.

The Beers Criteria is a list of approximately 30 drugs that would be inappropriate to prescribe to elderly people. The reason that drugs can be inappropriate for elders and not for younger generations is that as you age, the body undergoes physiological changes, The drugs defined within the Beers Criteria have very negative side effects when the body has undergone these changes. Some of the side effects are: evidence of cancer, toxic effects, rashes, and liver damage. However, these side effects only occur during old age, and the drugs contained within the Beers list are perfectly suitable for healthy young individuals. 

According to a study done in 2007, it was discovered that 27% of seniors took some kind of Beers List drugs during 2005-2006. Although this is improvement from the 34% of users in 2000-2001, it is still an unsafe percentage. Doctors and physicians are trying to spread the word about the Beers list and how dangerous its contents can be. So if you have elderly parents, make sure to double check that they are not taking any of the inappropriate drugs.