==== Front
Innov Aging
Innov Aging
innovateage
Innovation in Aging
2399-5300 Oxford University Press US 

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.2481
igaa057.2481
Abstracts
Session 6200 (Symposium)
AcademicSubjects/SOC02600
Antipsychotic and Psychotropic Prescribing in Assisted Living
Zimmerman Sheryl 1 Sloane Philip 1 Wretman Christopher 1 Miller Stephanie 2 Preisser John 1 1 
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States
2 
Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States
2020 
16 12 2020 
16 12 2020 
4 Suppl 1 Program Abstracts from The GSA 2020 Annual Scientific Meeting “Turning 75: Why Age Matters”706 706
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America.2020This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Abstract
The Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services has brought national attention to potentially inappropriate antipsychotic prescribing for residents with dementia in nursing homes, but no such attention has been paid to prescribing in assisted living (AL), despite the fact that more than 40% of AL residents have moderate/severe dementia. This study examined antipsychotic and other psychotropic prescribing in AL using a seven-state sample of 250 communities, and examined correlates of prescribing; analyses used weights based on probability proportional to bed size to derive state-level estimates. Overall, 19% of residents were taking an antipsychotic medication (27% of those with dementia); corresponding numbers for antidepressants were 46% (54%) and for anxiolytics/hypnotics were 24% (28%; both p <.001). By way of example, communities that did not have an RN or LPN were more likely to prescribe antipsychotics (34% vs. 17%; p<.001). The discussion will highlight next steps regarding practice, policy, and research.