To condemn the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) as ageist when it limits access to donepezil is to fall for the vendor's advertising and sponsored trials.1 There is really no evidence that donepezil does anyone any good. Two proper randomised clinical trials that are not sponsored by the vendors show there is no benefit whatsoever to this drug.2 3
In particular, neither carers nor patients can tell any difference between donepezil and placebo. The tremendous wall of vendor sponsored randomised controlled trials has created a terrible false impression about these drugs, and desperate families seek desperate remedies.
Competing interests: None declared.
References
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