This event is a hybrid attendance event, please use the register button above to attend in person, or alternatively use the below link to attend online.
Registration for online attendance
Overview:
Join us on 17th March in-person or online for a discussion with Dr Mark Horowitz, lead author of the Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines. This informative event will provide valuable insights, evidence-based strategies, and practical guidance on the deprescribing of antidepressants followed by a thought-provoking Q&A session.
Increasing rates of antidepressant prescribing worldwide have raised concerns among healthcare and regulatory organisations. Australia has relatively high rates of antidepressant prescribing, with Tasmania exceeding the national average.
There are many patients for whom it may be appropriate to consider deprescribing however traditional approaches to stopping psychotropic medication, including antidepressants, can cause distress and harm. Deprescribing should be evidence based and involve shared decision making between patient and clinician about treatment goals, risks and benefits of ongoing medication use versus cessation, and a plan for ongoing follow up. While awareness of this important issue is growing, barriers to safe deprescribing remain, and include both individual and systemic factors. The Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines, published in 2024, address a significant gap in evidence based, practical information for clinicians and patients navigating psychotropic deprescribing and are RACGP endorsed. Additional Australian resources have been developed which can further support the practical application of these guidelines and will also be discussed.
Primary Health Tasmania is seeking RACGP and ACRRM accreditation for this event
Learning outcomes:
- Explain why traditional approaches to antidepressant deprescribing may be unsuccessful
- Develop confidence to discuss antidepressant deprescribing strategies with patients
- Differentiate clinical features of antidepressant withdrawal from other causes of similar symptoms
- Locate resources to support antidepressant deprescribing
Do you have a question for Dr Horowitz?
You can submit your questions for this session in advance using the following link – Question submission
Speaker information:
Dr Mark Horowitz MBBS PhD is Clinical Research Fellow in Psychiatry in the National Health Service (NHS) in England, Visiting Lecturer in Psychopharmacology at King’s College London, and a trainee psychiatrist. He has a PhD from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience at King’s College London in the neurobiology of depression and antidepressant action. He is the lead author of the Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines, which provides the basis for national guidance in the UK from the NHS for prescribers on how to safely stop psychiatric drugs and has been endorsed by the RACGP in Australia, and the Royal Pharmaceutical Society in the UK.
He co-authored the recent Royal College of Psychiatrists’ guidance on ‘Stopping Antidepressants’, and his work informed the recent NICE guidelines on safe tapering of psychiatric medications, including antidepressants, benzodiazepines and z-drugs. He has worked with the NHS to develop national guidance for safe deprescribing for clinicians and has been commissioned by Health Education England to prepare a teaching module on how to safely stop antidepressants for the NHS.
He has written several papers about safe approaches to tapering psychiatric medications including publications in The Lancet Psychiatry, JAMA Psychiatry and Schizophrenia Bulletin. He is an Associate Editor of the journal Therapeutic Advances in Psychopharmacology. He has an interest in rational psychopharmacology and deprescribing psychiatric medication. He has experienced the difficulty of coming off psychiatric medications first hand which has informed much of his work.
Dr Anna Seth is a GP with a mental health interest, originally from the UK. She graduated from Newcastle Upon Tyne in 2003, completed RACGP fellowship in 2010 in Far North Queensland, and has worked in Tasmania since 2011, initially in the Huon Valley, then Kingston and now in North Hobart. Anna has worked for Primary Health Tasmania since 2021 as a clinical editor for HealthPathways and as clinical trainer for the mental health initial assessment and referral project.
Angus Thompson is a Pharmacist Consultant and Clinical Editor at Primary Health Tasmania. Angus trained in the UK, working primarily in Hospital and General Practice pharmacist roles before relocating to Tasmania in 2008. Alongside his role at Primary Health Tasmania, Angus works as a Consultant Clinical Pharmacist conducting Home Medicines Reviews in Southern Tasmania, Lecturer in Therapeutics & Pharmacy Practice at the University of Tasmania, expert reviewer for the National Prescribing Curriculum program and Subject Matter Expert for the Australian Pharmacy Council.