medications prescribed today can cause diabetes, heart disease, weight gain and stroke. my risk of heart disease, diabetes, and high blood pressure. …
Things Consumers Should Know About their Health
By Cindy Cates, TMHCA Certified Peer Specialist
A recent report in the Journal of the American Medical Association warns
individuals diagnosed with a mental illness that on average, they die 25-30
years earlier than the general population This is an alarming statistic
agrees psychiatrists, mental health consumers and mental health
professionals alike Officials are scrambling to come up with an
explanation and a solution
The journal reports that most of the risk factors are cardiac related
Many of the psychiatric medications prescribed today can cause diabetes,
heart disease, weight gain and stroke This is a problem faced by most
consumers as the newer medications today treat symptoms more aggressively
than the older ones Atypical antipsychotics, for example have decreased
side effects in some areas such as the risk of tardive dyskinesia Their
negative effects on weight gain, however, make many wonder if theyre worth
the added risk
Taking these newer medications helps ease my symptoms a lot, said TMHCA
assistant director Connie Levenhagen But they really make me gain weight
and increase my risk
of heart disease, diabetes, and high blood pressure
I already have these illnesses run in my family Knowing I may have an
increased risk of developing them will definitely make me more cautious I
will get a check up at my primary care doctor more often
The question many providers are wrestling over are what can we do to
reduce this risk for psychiatric patients? How can we increase awareness of
this problem? What safety guards can we put in place?
One known fact is that patients with serious psychiatric illness are more
likely to smoke - between 50 percent and 80 percent smoke cigarettes This
itself, increases cardiac risk
Several other factors conspire to elevate risk including reduced access to
appropriate medical care Major mental disorders can significantly impair
a persons ability to work and learn, so patients tend to have lower
incomes and poorer dietary habits Often they rely on high fat/calorie
fast food
All of this adds up, psychiatrists say And many people with mental
illness are significantly less likely to receive therapies of proven
benefit for problems with cholesterol, diabetes, hypertension or heart
disease Those who have survived a heart attack are less
likely to receive
appropriate medications, cardiac catheterization procedures of bypass
surgery than heart-attack patients without mental illness
So what are doctors doing to address these problems? A solution will emerge
only if psychiatrists and primary-care providers can work together
This, the article says, requires coordination And coordination between
psychiatric professionals and primary-care providers is not easy when they
often are physically located in different places There are transportation
issues and scheduling issues Research indicates that when patients with
mental disorders have to go across the hall, it reduces the probability
they will get care If they have to cross the street, the probability gets
even lower If its across town, well without case managers and others
working closely with these patients, in general those follow-ups wont
happen
Were not saying psychiatrists should start prescribing lipid lowering
agents or diabetes drugs, but they are on the front lines- seeing
psychiatric patients much more than primary care providers Its important
that psychiatrists begin to employ some basic screening techniques like
regularly weighing their patients,
taking blood pressure and screening
appropriately for blood glucose, cholesterol and triglycerides
One things for sure, though, the article stresses Patients do not need to
stop taking their medications if they have a serious psychiatric condition
These medicines are vitally important for many consumers if they are to
function in life Quality of life can be drastically affected if these
illnesses are untreated
In the meantime, consumers should be made aware that a disparity does exist
in life expectancy compared to those individuals who are not diagnosed with
a mental illness
We encourage consumers to take care of themselves better, get screened for
high risk factors, exercise and take measures to lose weight, said Anthony
Fox, Director of the Tennessee Mental Health Consumers Association
Awareness is the first step, I think Thats why were publishing this
article
