Side effect profiles of atypical antipsychotics, typical antipsychotics, or no psychotropic medications in persons with mental retardation.

Antipsychotic medications have been used to treat a variety of behavioral and psychiatric disturbances in persons with mental retardation. Given the well-documented side effects of traditional antipsychotics, newer "atypical" antipsychotics have been well received in this population due to initial reports of a more favorable side effect profile. We compared the side effect profiles of both the typical and atypical antipsychotics using a comprehensive instrument, the Matson Evaluation of Drug Side Effects (MEDS) scale. Participants taking atypical antipsychotics did not differ in overall side effects from a matched control group taking no psychotropic medication, and both groups showed significantly fewer overall side effects than participants taking typical antipsychotics. Subscales designed to measure involuntary movements (e.g., akathisia, tardive dyskinesia) detected differences between participants taking either atypical or typical antipsychotics with respect to akathisia only. Implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.