Study: Nursing Home Residents Not Protected From Antipsychotic Drugs Under Trump

Almost 300,000 nursing home residents are given antipsychotic drugs each week, even though most have no psychosis to justify it. But since the beginning of the Trump administration, nursing homes have rarely paid a price for even the most serious misuse of the drugs.

That's according to a new report out Tuesday from health researchers for Rep. Richard Neal, D-Mass., chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Rachel Dolan, the lead author of the study, found that citations for over-prescribing antipsychotics to nursing home residents declined significantly between the end of the Obama administration and the first half of the Trump administration.

"Citations for antipsychotic misuse in skilled nursing facilities increased by 200% between 2015 and 2017 under the Obama administration. And then those citations declined by 22%" under Trump, says Dolan.