Incontinence Drugs Linked to Memory Problems

April 2008

Commonly used incontinence drugs may have adverse side effects on elderly patients, researchers have found. The findings, made public at a meeting of the American Academy of Neurology, show that incontinence drugs may be linked to memory problems in older adults.

Researchers studied the medicine use and cognitive test scores of 870 participants for eight years. They discovered that those who took drugs called anticholingerics had a 50 percent faster rate of cognitive decline than those who did not take the drugs. Anticholingerics include medicines taken for blood pressure, asthma, Parkinson's disease, and incontinence drugs such as Detrol and Ditropan.

Confusion and memory impairment were added to prescribing information for Detrol in 2006. Detrol has been prescribed more than 100 million times since it was introduced by Pfizer in 1998.