Each person s health, severity of dementia and frequency of aggressive behaviors were evaluated prior to and during the study. The severity of aggression was improved by two to four times more in people taking risperidone than those taking a placebo. The number of physical or verbally aggressive episodes improved by 34 percent for people taking risperidone as compared to 8 percent of people taking the placebo. People on haloperidol also showed an improvement in aggressive behaviors which was 20 percent greater than those taking the placebo. In comparing the two medications, risperidone had up to a 40 percent greater improvement on aggressive behaviors than haloperidol.
Researchers also suggest risperidone is more tolerable in elderly patients than haloperidol.
Medications causing drowsiness may appear to improve aggression. Researchers determined that haloperidol and risperidone caused some drowsiness, but overall it did not affect study results. The study was completed by 223 people. The most common reasons patients gave for dropping out of the study were side effects and lack of effectiveness. The dropouts came equally from the risperidone, haloperidol and placebo groups.