Posted by Larry Hoover on February 9, 2016, at 7:12:04
In reply to Re: Benzodiazepines: Full article from BMJ, posted by Phillipa on February 5, 2016, at 9:51:47
> Here is the full article from this post. Posted in BMJ. What are your thoughts on this. So many should be relieved!!! Phillipa
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> http://www.bmj.com/content/352/bmj.i90Thanks for the full-text.
I like the way the article was written. They thoughtfully and thoroughly discuss the strengths and weaknesses of their methodology, as well as differences between this work and earlier reports on the subject by others.
What I think is a significant finding of this study is that there appears to be a jump in benzo use in the year or two before diagnosis of dementia is made. The lowest rate of exposure to benzos in the most recent past is the most strongly associated with the risk for dementia; the 95% confidence interval is entirely above risk =1 (so any exposure is riskier than not). However, one of the first symptoms of dementia is anxiety. Another is insomnia. A third is depression. All of these can lead to a prescription for benzos.
A reasonable explanation for that connection is what is called a reverse risk. The early onset of dementia is leading to new benzo exposures.
Perhaps, and we don't know for sure, the earlier studies connecting benzo exposure to dementia were capturing this reverse risk scenario, and had insufficient data quality to tease it out.
Lar
poster:Larry Hoover
thread:1085929
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20160131/msgs/1086051.html