Patients and Prescribers Reported Different Barriers to Benzodiazepine Deprescribing

Assumed patient resistance can differ from what patients actually report.

What the supplied paper reports

A systematic review of stakeholder perspectives found patients could be willing to discuss stopping benzodiazepine receptor agonists, while physicians sometimes anticipated resistance. Nurses described knowledge and communication barriers. Education emerged as a shared facilitator.

Study limits

The literature emphasized patients and physicians; other stakeholder perspectives were less represented. Reported attitudes do not establish actual discontinuation rates or prove that one barrier caused continued prescribing.

Forensic implications

Document the discussion rather than inferring refusal from continued use. Distinguish a patient’s preference, a clinician’s expectation and an implemented taper plan. The review supports better communication, but cannot establish that any individual continuation represented unwillingness, neglect or inevitable treatment failure.

Source and related reading

Source: PMC8073998, supplied full-text paper. Findings are paraphrased; forensic implications are an interpretation.

Related: Cirrhosis Deprescribing Interviews Identify Barriers, Not Proof That Stopping Benzodiazepines Prevents Encephalopathy.