Elderly people with dementia-related psychosis (a severe mental health problem) taking atypical antipsychotic drugs, including SAPHRIS, are at an increased risk for death compared with those taking placebo (sugar tablet). SAPHRIS is not approved for the treatment of people with dementia-related psychosis (see Boxed Warning). Continued below

Tools

The tools provided here may be useful to you throughout your treatment with SAPHRIS sublingual tablets.


A tool you can use online
Tracker screenshotKeeping Track of Your Progress
Use this online tool to keep track of how you are doing at the start of your treatment with SAPHRIS and during your treatment, especially before each visit with your healthcare provider. Set up reminders to go to your office visits. Share the completed tracker with your healthcare provider at your next visit.

PDF A print version of the tracker is also available.
Print ToolsTools you can print and use
Download and print helpful tools you can use during your treatment with SAPHRIS.

Questions for Your Healthcare Provider
This provides a list of questions you may want to ask your healthcare provider. You may want to take it with you to your next visit.

Checklist for Caregivers
This tool may help you as a caregiver think about ways you can support your family member or friend.


Watch the video
Watch the videoHow to Take SAPHRIS
This video provides step-by-step instructions for how to take SAPHRIS.

SAPHRIS is a type of medicine called an atypical antipsychotic. It is approved for the treatment of schizophrenia in adults.

Important Safety Information

Tardive dyskinesia (TD): Tell your healthcare provider if you experience uncontrollable movements of the face, tongue, or other parts of the body. These could be signs of a serious and sometimes permanent side effect (TD). The risk for developing TD and the chance that it will become permanent is thought to increase the longer a person takes the medicine and the more medicine a person takes over time. TD can develop after a person has been taking the medicine for a short time at low doses, although this is much less common. There is no known treatment for TD, but it may go away partially or completely if the person stops taking the medicine.

High blood sugar: If you have diabetes or risk factors for diabetes, such as being overweight or a family history of diabetes, your blood sugar should be tested at the beginning of and throughout treatment with SAPHRIS. Complications of diabetes can be serious and even life threatening. Tell your healthcare provider if you have blood sugar problems or signs of diabetes, such as being thirsty all the time, going to the bathroom a lot, or feeling weak or hungry.

Weight gain: Some patients may gain weight while taking SAPHRIS. Your healthcare provider should check your weight regularly.

Other important information to remember:

  • Get up slowly after sitting or lying down to avoid getting dizzy, especially at the start of treatment, or when your dose is increased. Light-headedness or faintness caused by a sudden change in heart rate and blood pressure when rising quickly from a sitting position has been reported with SAPHRIS
  • Do NOT drive or use dangerous machines until you know how SAPHRIS affects you, because SAPHRIS and medicines like it can affect your judgment, thinking, and motor skills
  • Be careful when exercising or when doing things likely to cause dehydration or make you warm, because SAPHRIS may make you more sensitive to heat. You may have trouble cooling off
  • Do NOT drink alcohol
  • Breastfeeding is NOT recommended
  • The most common side effects that occurred with SAPHRIS were sleepiness, dizziness, uncontrolled movements of the body and face, muscle stiffness, weight gain, numbing of the mouth, and restlessness

You are encouraged to report negative side effects of prescription drugs to the FDA. Visit www.fda.gov/medwatch, or call 1-800-FDA-1088.

Please click here for Prescribing Information, including the Boxed Warning about increased risk of death in elderly people with dementia-related psychosis (a severe mental health problem), and discuss it with your healthcare provider.

This site is intended only for residents of the United States, its territories, and Puerto Rico.

SAPHRIS is a registered trademark of N.V. Organon, a subsidiary of Merck & Co., Inc.

Copyright © 2013 MSD Oss B.V., a subsidiary of Merck & Co., Inc. All rights reserved.
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NEUR-1065684-0000 03/13