Pharmacological treatments for psychotic symptoms in dementia: A systematic review with pairwise and network meta-analysis

Psychotic symptoms of dementia are highly prevalent and lead to poor medical outcomes and substantial dysfunction. To date, which drug to use remains controversial without a summary of all direct or indirect comparisons of pharmacotherapy. Therefore, we conducted a systematic review with pairwise and network meta-analysis to examine efficacy and tolerability outcomes of pharmacological treatments in dementia patients. MEDLINE, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, and PubMed were searched systematically up to August 31, 2020. We included trials of cholinesterase inhibitors (ChEIs), memantine, antipsychotics, antidepressants, and mood stabilizers, with final approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. We ranked the comparative effects of all drugs against placebo with surface under the cumulative ranking (SUCRA) probabilities. This analysis is based on 34 trials, which included 10,415 patients randomly assigned to 15 commonly used drug regimens. Donepezil (standardized mean difference [SMD] −0.30, 95% credible interval [CrI] −0.50 to −0.12; SUCRA, 0.85), memantine (SMD −0.20, 95%CrI −0.34 to −0.07; SUCRA, 0.68) and aripiprazole (SMD −0.17, 95% CrI −0.32 to −0.02; SUCRA, 0.62) showed greater benefit than placebo, and with relatively good tolerability in network meta-analyses. Risperidone was also found to be more efficacious than placebo (SMD −0.16, 95% CrI −0.28 to −0.05; SUCRA, 0.60), but with poor tolerability (odds ratios [OR] 1.50, 95% CrI 1.06–2.26). Donepezil, memantine, haloperidol, aripiprazole and risperidone were more efficacious than quetiapine (SMDs ranged from −0.36 to −0.22). Besides, donepezil, memantine and mirtazapine were more efficacious than sertraline (SMDs ranged from −0.47 to −0.36). Most of the results were rated as “low” to “very low”. Several effective treatment choices for psychotic symptoms are available across drug classes. Donepezil, memantine and aripiprazole are probably the appropriate options to consider when a pharmacological treatment is indicated. Given the limitations of the meta-analytic approach and the low methodological quality of the majority of studies, our results should be cautiously interpreted.