optimal management of challenging behaviours in dementia
TRANSCRIPT
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Optimal Management of Challenging Behaviours in Dementia: An Update on Pharmacologic and Non-Pharmacologic Approaches
Andrea Iaboni, MD, DPhil, FRCPC
Toronto Rehab Institute, UHN
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Learning objectives
• Recognize the expected benefits and side effects of medications used to manage challenging behaviours
• Construct a treatment plan for the management of challenging behaviours that incorporates recent evidence
• Consider a range of non-pharmacological behaviour management tools in a treatment plan
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Outline
1. Review of challenging behaviours
2. Evidence-based recommendations about medications for challenging behaviours
3. From research to clinical practice:
– Understanding clinical trials
– Applying evidence to clinical practice
4. An approach to treating challenging behaviours in severe dementia
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Definitions
Challenging behaviours
• Actions or activities that cause difficulty for the person or others
– Aggressive and non-aggressive
Neuropsychiatric symptoms
• Psychiatric manifestations of disorders
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Challenging behaviours • Screaming
• Repetitive questions
• Constant requests for help
• Pacing
• Shadowing
• Undressing
• Masturbating publicly
• Inappropriate urinating
• Hoarding
• Dismantling
• Hiding items
• Intentional falling
• Eating/Drinking excessively
• Eating inappropriate substances
• Threatening • Swearing • Verbal abuse • Hitting • Pushing • Spitting • Biting • Grabbing • Pinching • Scratching • Hair-pulling
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Neuropsychiatric symptoms
Psychosis
Delusions Hallucinations
Psychosis
Delusions Hallucinations
Mood
Depression Anxiety
Elevated mood
Mood
Depression Anxiety
Elevated mood Activity/
Drive
Apathy Hyperactivity Restlessness
Sleep disturbance
Activity/ Drive
Apathy
Hyperactivity Restlessness
Sleep disturbance
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Neuropsychiatric Symptoms in Alzheimer’s Dementia
Lyketsos, JAMA, 2002
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Mod-Severe
Mild
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Challenging behaviour
Psychosis Psychosis Mood Mood Activity/ Drive
Activity/ Drive
Personal Social Environment
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Current CCCDTD4 recommendations • Medications if inadequate response to non-
pharm interventions • If evidence of depression consider
antidepressants • Risperidone, olanzapine, aripiprazole for severe
agitation/aggression/psychosis with risk to self or others
• Limited evidence for antidepressants for psychosis/agitation
• Limited to no evidence for cholinesterase inhibitors, memantine, valproate, trazodone, quetiapine
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UNDERSTANDING CLINICAL TRIALS
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How do we study the effects of medications? • Randomized controlled trials
• Short duration, small numbers
• Selection of subjects
• Heterogenous study population – Aggression/ Agitation/ Psychosis
• Dosing strategies fixed
• Clinically meaningful outcomes
• Placebo response
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Evidence for antipsychotic medications: CATIE-AD trial
OLANZAPINE RISPERIDONE QUETIAPINE PLACEBO
Mean dose 5.5 mg 1.0 mg 56.5 mg
Discontinuation due to intolerance
24% 18% 16% 5%
Response (At least minimal improvement)
32% 29% 26% 21%
Schneider, 2006, NEJM
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Cohen-Mansfield Agitation Inventory • 29 different behaviours
• Scored by frequency:
– 1 – Never, 2 - Less than once a week, 3 - Once or twice a week , 4 - Several times a week , 5 - Once or twice a day, 6 - Several times a day , 7 - Several times an hour
• 3 factors
– Factor 1 - Aggressive behavior
– Factor 2 - Physically nonaggressive behavior
– Factor 3 - Verbally agitated behavior
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Risperidone • Meta-analysis of 3 trials
• Psychosis, Aggression, or Agitation (CMAI=60)
• N=809 people
• 10-13 weeks of treatment
• Compared with placebo
PLACEBO
BETTER
RISPERIDONE
BETTER
NO
DIFFERENCE
CHANGE IN CMAI AGGRESSION SCORE
Schenider, 2006, AJGP
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SSRI Antidepressant
• Meta-analysis of 2 trials
• Compared with placebo
• Agitation/Aggression, baseline CMAI=35
• N=250
PLACEBO
BETTER
SSRI
BETTER
NO
DIFFERENCE
CHANGE IN TOTAL CMAI SCORE
Seitz, 2011, Cochrane review
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Cholinesterase inhibitors and Memantine
• Studies often excluded people with behaviours
• 2 studies for CheI and 1 for memantine looking at acute agitation (baseline CMAI mid-60s) were negative
• Use in early dementia may delay or prevent onset of behavioural disturbances
• Side effects/ tolerability issues for CheI
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Mean Total Scores on CMAI from Trial Entry through Follow-up for Treatment and Placebo Groups
Howard RJ, 2007, NEJM
Donepezil
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Fox, 2012, PLoS ONE
Memantine
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Benefits of medications • Many challenges to assessing benefits of
medications from clinical trials
– Symptoms too variable, or too ill-defined (ie “agitation”) and difficult to measure change
• On aggregate, medications help about 30% of patients, with an average improvement by 2 points on behavioural scales above placebo
– They help a few a lot, some a little, most not at all
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Risks of medications
• Decision to use medications need to be put in context of risks
• Risks of medications are worrisome, but behaviours are also risky and distressing
• Risks always outweigh benefits where:
– Expected benefits very minimal
– Side effects of medication are very distressing or uncomfortable to patient
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Medication risks Antipsychotics (in dementia)
Risk of parkinsonism 12%
Risk of tardive dyskinesia 5% per year
Risk of death 1.5x (3.5% vs. 2.3%; 1 death per 100 treated)
Antidepressants (in depressed elderly)
Risk of falls 1.8 x
Risk of fractures 1.5 x
Risk of death ?
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Antipsychotic-induced Movement disorders
• Dystonia
• Akathisia
• Parkinsonism
• Tardive dyskinesia • tongue protrusion
• grimacing
• rapid eye blinking
• lip smacking, pursing, or puckering
• other writhing involuntary movements
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CONTROL
BETTER
“X”
BETTER
CHANGE IN CMAI PHYSICAL AGGRESSION SCORE
Guess the treatment “X” • Moderate behavioural disturbance (excluding
severely aggressive patients)
• N=352, baseline CMAI=49
CONTROL
BETTER
“X”
BETTER
CHANGE IN CMAI VERBAL AGGRESSION SCORE
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Stepwise protocol for treatment of pain
• Individual approach based on current medication regime
• Acetaminophen oral (max. increase to 3 g/day),
• Extended release morphine oral (max. 20 mg/day), or
• Pregabaline oral (max. 300 mg/day)
• Buprenorphine transdermal plaster (if can’t swallow)
• Combinations if needed Husebo, 2013, AJGP
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Non-pharmacological interventions Studies limited by small size, differing techniques and outcomes and rarely replicated
• Simulated presence or recorded conversation (Camberg et al., 1999; Garland et al., 2007)
• Aromatherapy with lavender (Holmes et al., 2002; Lin et al., 2007) or lemon balm (Ballard et al., 2002)
• Music therapies (Garland et al., 2007; Svansdottir and Snaedal, 2006).
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Guess the Intervention
• N=72, mean CMAI = 61
• Clustering by nursing home
• Improvement in CMAI by 35% in treatment group and 11% in placebo
Lemon Balm
Aromatherapy
PLACEBO
BETTER
Intervention
BETTER
CHANGE IN CMAI SCORE
-25 -20 -15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 20 25
Ballard, 2002, J Clin Psychiatry
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Guess the intervention part 2
• N=289 nursing home residents
• Persistent need-driven behaviours making it difficult for staff to provide them with quality care
• Baseline CMAI = 50
CONTROL
BETTER
Intervention
BETTER
CHANGE IN CMAI SCORE
-25 -20 -15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 20 25
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CADRES: Person-Centred Care
• Included use of medications
• Improvement in behaviours
• More falls, more antipsychotic use (although drop from baseline)
Chenoweth, 2009, Lancet Neurol
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AN APPROACH TO CHALLENGING BEHAVIOURS N=1
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Applying evidence to the individual: N=1
• OBSERVE AND MEASURE
• Non-pharmacological, person-centred interventions
• Careful selection of medication
• Start low, go slow
• OBSERVE AND MEASURE SOME MORE!
• Monitor for efficacy
• Monitor for side effects
• Plan for discontinuation
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Red flags
• Targeted violence or threats of violence
• Aggression (as opposed to resistance) – Resistance = A defensive action, an attempt to
protect the self from harm
– Aggression = An offensive action, angry and destructive, intended to cause injury
• Behaviours based on complex delusional beliefs or hallucinations – Delusions vs Disorientation
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Observe/Study/Discuss/ Describe/Measure/Evaluate
• Not all agitation is alike!
• What are the symptoms underlying these behaviours?
• What are these behaviours communicating?
• Is there a pattern to the behaviour?
• Observe ourselves too: How are we managing the behaviour now? Can we be reinforcing the behaviour?
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Challenging behaviour
Psychosis Psychosis Mood Mood Activity/ Drive
Activity/ Drive
Personal Social Environment
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Non-pharmacological interventions
• Try them out!
• Be systematic– use a care plan, monitor adherence to the care plan and evaluate regularly.
• Involve families, the patient, all care staff
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Symptom-based approach
MILD
SSRI
ChEI
MODERATE/
SEVERE
Risperidone
(Olanzapine)
(Aripiprazole)
No evidence Pain management
SSRI
Psychosis Psychosis Mood Mood Activity/ Drive
Activity/ Drive
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Use of medications
• Start low, go slow but keep going if tolerated, have target in mind
For behaviours in dementia
Initial dose Target dose Maximum dose
Risperidone 0.125mg 0.5-1mg 2mg
Aripiprazole 2mg 5-10mg 15mg
Sertraline 25mg 100-150mg 200mg
Citalopram 5mg 10-20mg 30-40mg *monitor QTc
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Monitor for efficacy
1) Observe and re-measure!
2) Have realistic treatment expectations
3) If no benefit or worsening, re-consider the treatment (change dose, change agent)
4) Don’t persist with something that hasn’t been helpful!
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Monitor for side effects
• Parkinsonism
• Tardive Dyskinesia
• Akathisia
• Falls
• Worsening confusion
• Hyponatremia with SSRI antidepressants
• Cardiac side effects
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Plan for trial discontinuation
• Early (within 3-4 months) discontinuation of antipsychotics is now seen as standard of practice
• Several discontinuation trials to date showing little symptom exacerbation (for most patients)
– ADAD: 60% switched to placebo were relapse-free at 32 weeks
– Baseline severity of behaviour is risk factor for relapse
Devanand (2012) NEJM
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N=1 in practice
• Observe/Measure: ABC charting, behavioural logs, behavioural scale
• Formulation of behaviour, underlying symptoms and causes
• Systematic application of non-pharm interventions (care plan with monitoring)
• Initiate medications: slow but steady
• Observe/Measure: Benefits and side effects
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Conclusion
• Clinical trials demonstrate some benefit for medications for challenging behaviours in dementia, but also illustrate their limitations.
• Non-pharmacological approaches are also effective with few down-sides.
• Optimal treatment for challenging behaviours is INDIVIDUALIZED and SYSTEMATIC.