Working in the mental health field, we often prescribe antipsychotics to patients suffering from Schizophrenia, Schizoaffective disorder, Bipolar Disorder, unthreatened Major depressive disorder, or substance-induced psychosis. Although effective, antipsychotics have unfavorable side effects known as extrapyramidal side effects (EPSs), which cause patients to abruptly interrupt their therapy (Ali et al., 2021).
One serious movement disorder caused by exposure to psychotropics is tardive dyskinesia which may leave irreversible abnormal movements if not identified at the onset. The Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale (AIMS) is one of the instruments that is now being used often to identify Tardive Dyskinesia but has not yet been implemented as a routine standard for assessment of tardive dyskinesia (TDD) in most institutions (Bhidayasiri et al., 2020).
In the clinic I work for, not all providers utilize the AIMS during their visits with patients on psychotropics. My PICOT question is: In mental health providers treating patients requiring psychotropic medications (P), does administering the AIMS (Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale) every visit help to identify patients at risk for tardive dyskinesia with AIMS score over 0 (I), as compared to no current screening (C), reduce the risk of tardive dyskinesia by 25%(O) over four to 6 weeks?
I hope this project will provide the necessary evidence to encourage all psychiatric providers to implement the utilization of AIMS during each visit/ encounter with their patients.