An Electronic Clinical Decision Support Tool to Reduce Low-value Antipsychotic Prescriptions

Importance: Among patients with Alzheimer's disease and its related dementias (ADRD) with behavioral disturbances, antipsychotic prescriptions have limited efficacy and substantially increase risk of death. Despite an FDA 2005 "black box" warning and multiple professional physician society guidelines discouraging their use, physicians continue to frequently prescribe antipsychotic medications as first-line therapy for behavioral disturbances among patients with ADRD.

Objective: This study will measure the impact of a multi-pronged electronic health record (EHR) clinical decision support (CDS) tool intervention to reduce physician prescriptions of new antipsychotic medications among older adults with ADRD.

Design, Setting, and Participants: Utilizing a pragmatic parallel cluster-randomized trial design, the study will randomize eligible physicians from a large urban academic medical center to either receive an EHR CDS tool (intervention) or not (control) when they prescribe a new antipsychotic medication during a visit with a patient with ADRD. The intervention will include three components: (1) alerts the prescriber that antipsychotic prescriptions increase mortality; (2) offers non-pharmacological behavioral resources for caregivers; and if the prescriber does not cancel the order (3) auto-defaults the prescription to contain the lowest dose and number of pills (n=30) without refills. In addition, the PI will email all providers randomized to the intervention arm in order to make them aware of the components of this intervention and its motivation. Acknowledging the clinical complexity of this vulnerable patient population, the multidisciplinary study team attempted to design the intervention to maximize impact while minimizing clinician burden. Over a one-year timeframe, the study team will compare the cumulative total of new antipsychotic pill-days prescribed (primary outcome) by physicians in the intervention group versus in the control group.

Hypothesis: This pragmatic trial will advance understanding of how a multi-pronged EHR CDS tool can potentially reduce harmful, low-value care among older adults with ADRD.

Inclusion criteria

• Physicians who will be eligible to receive the EHR CDS tool intervention include those who provide ambulatory care in the UCLA health system and have newly prescribed antipsychotics (e.g., Quetiepine, Olanzapine, Risperidone, Aripiprazole, Haloperidol, Clozapine) for eligible patients (described below) at the medical center in the last 24 months.
• Eligible patients will be enrolled in the study during their first encounter with one of the randomized physicians (see above) during which a new antipsychotic medication order will be initiated. Inclusion criteria for patients will include: 1) having an assigned primary care physician (PCP) and/or assignment to an Accountable Care Organization (ACO) at UCLA Health, and: 2) being part of the health system's EHR-based dementia registry.

Exclusion criteria

• Patients who have diagnosis codes for schizophrenic disorders, delusion disorders, bipolar disorders, or other non-organic psychoses on their problem list.
• Patients with Parkinson's disease on their problem list
• Patients who have been prescribed antipsychotics in the prior 12 months