EVIDENCE LIBRARY
Antipsychotic Hypothermia Review Listed Benzodiazepines as a Coexisting Factor Without Estimating Their Relative Risk
A systematic case review identified benzodiazepine use in many reported hypothermia cases. It did not quantify the independent risk from that co-medication.
A systematic case review identified benzodiazepine use in many reported hypothermia cases. It did not quantify the independent risk from that co-medication.
The selected cases
The review assembled fifty-seven antipsychotic-associated hypothermia cases and considered factors such as age, cold exposure, thyroid disease, and co-medication. Benzodiazepines were a common additional exposure.
Some people received several antipsychotics, so drug-instance counts exceeded the number of patients. The paper also discussed the limitations of spontaneous reporting.
No exposure denominator
A collection of reported cases lacks the number of otherwise similar treated people who did not develop hypothermia. It therefore cannot establish incidence or the relative contribution of each cofactor.
Benzodiazepine presence does not prove that it caused the temperature change, while antipsychotic exposure does not exclude sepsis, endocrine illness, environment, or other medicines. For a clinical opinion, reconstruct temperature, exposure changes, physiology, and competing explanations. The review supplies a safety concern requiring assessment, not a benzodiazepine-specific probability or a single-drug causal verdict.
Source paper
Original analysis of the supplied journal article, identified as PMC5594062.