Preoperative Management of Medications for Psychiatric Diseases

There is a lack of guidelines for preoperative management of psychiatric medications leading to variation in care and the potential for perioperative complications and surgical procedure cancellations on the day of surgery. The Society for Perioperative Assessment and Quality Improvement identified preoperative psychiatric medication management as an area in which consensus could improve patient care. The aim of this consensus statement is to provide recommendations to clinicians regarding preoperative psychiatric medication management. Several categories of drugs were identified including antidepressants, mood stabilizers, anxiolytics, antipsychotics, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder medications. Literature searches and review of primary and secondary data sources were performed for each medication/medication class. We used a modified Delphi process to develop consensus recommendations for preoperative management of individual medications in each of these drug categories. While most medications should be continued perioperatively to avoid risk of relapse of the psychiatric condition, adjustments may need to be made on a case-by-case basis for certain drugs.