A fall in a nursing home is not always just an accident. Sometimes it starts with a pill.

Antipsychotic drugs are meant to treat serious mental illness. But many Georgia nursing homes still hand them out to older residents who only have dementia or who are simply hard to manage.

These drugs sedate people. They slow reaction time, weaken muscles, and throw off balance. A resident who was walking fine last month can become unsteady, dizzy, and prone to falling once the medication takes hold.

If your loved one broke a hip, hit their head, or suffered another injury after being placed on an antipsychotic they did not need, this may be more than bad luck. It may be neglect.

At Wagner Hughes Georgia Nursing Home Abuse Lawyers, our Atlanta nursing home abuse attorneys investigate cases like this every day. Call 404-900-6979 or fill out our confidential contact form to talk about what happened.

Why Do Nursing Homes Give Antipsychotics to Residents Who Don’t Need Them?

Antipsychotics are approved for conditions like schizophrenia. They are not approved to treat dementia. Yet understaffed facilities across Georgia often use them anyway, because a sedated resident is easier to manage than one who wanders, calls out, or resists care.

This practice is sometimes called a chemical restraint. It controls behavior by dulling the mind and body rather than addressing the actual cause of a resident’s distress, such as pain, boredom, fear, or an undiagnosed infection.

The scale of the problem is large. One recent report found that roughly one in five nursing home residents nationwide, more than 250,000 people, are given antipsychotic drugs, even though only a small share of that population has a diagnosis that would justify the medication.

How Do These Drugs Increase the Risk of a Fall?

Antipsychotics act on the brain and nervous system. Common side effects include:

• Drowsiness
• Low blood pressure when standing
• Muscle stiffness
• Slower reflexes

Put those together, and you get a resident who is more likely to trip, stumble, or lose their footing when getting out of bed or a chair. Some residents also develop tremors or an unsteady, shuffling walk that looks like Parkinson’s disease.

For an older body, a fall from standing height can cause a broken hip, a brain bleed, or an injury that never fully heals.

Doctors have known about this danger for years.

The FDA placed its strongest warning label on antipsychotic drugs used in elderly dementia patients back in 2005, and later extended that warning to the entire drug class. Despite that, the medications are still handed out across Georgia nursing homes and facilities nationwide.

What Warning Signs Should Georgia Families Watch For?

Families are often the first to notice something is wrong. Watch for:

• Sudden drowsiness, confusion, or a blank stare that was not there before
• A new, unsteady walk or trouble standing up from a chair
• A new prescription you were never told about or asked to consent to

If you notice these changes in a parent or grandparent at a facility in Atlanta or anywhere else in Georgia, ask to see the medication chart and request a care plan meeting right away.

Is Using Antipsychotics as a Chemical Restraint Legal in Georgia?

No. Federal nursing home law requires facilities to get informed consent before starting a resident on an antipsychotic, and it bans using any drug purely for staff convenience.

Georgia nursing homes must also document why the medication is medically necessary. When a facility skips these steps, cuts corners on staffing, and sedates residents instead of caring for them properly, that facility may be liable for any injury that follows, including a fall.

Talk to a Georgia Nursing Home Abuse Law Firm Today

A fall caused by unnecessary sedation is not something a family should have to just accept. Georgia nursing homes have a legal duty to protect residents, not medicate them into passivity.

Wagner Hughes Georgia Nursing Home Abuse Lawyers has recovered more than $42 million for injured residents and their families, and our team knows how to build these cases from the ground up.

Our nursing home fall attorneys offer a free, no-obligation review of your case, and you owe nothing unless we win. Call 404-900-6979 or fill out our confidential contact form today.