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Many physically-active people will return to recreational sports after having shoulder replacement surgery, research shows.

In fact, most of the people who had the surgery in order to continue to participate in sports reported that their ability had actually improved, Dr. Eric C. McCarty of the University of Colorado School of Medicine in Denver and colleagues found.

Most studies to date on activity after joint replacement has focused on hip and knee replacement, the researchers note in a report in the American Journal of Sports Medicine. The one small study that looked at shoulder replacement focused on golf.

To examine the ability of people to return to other types of activity after the surgery, McCarty’s team looked at 75 adults who underwent a total of 86 shoulder replacements. They were followed for up to 9.4 years, with average an average follow-up of 3.7 years.

Forty-eight of the study subjects (64 percent) said they had the surgery in order to keep playing sports, while 91 percent cited pain as a reason. Swimming was the most common activity, followed by golf. Before their shoulder problems developed, patients had engaged in their activity or activities of choice 2.6 days a week.

Within a year of the surgery, people were engaging in their sport 1.7 days a week, on average, and reported that it took them 5.8 months to return to full activity.

Twelve of 13 people who had enjoyed fishing before surgery returned to the sport, while 37 of 43 swimmers did. Three-quarters of golfers and tennis players were able to play their sport again after surgery.

The sport people had the hardest time returning to was softball, with only 2 of 10 people returning to the sport after surgery.

Among the 48 adults who had the surgery at least in part to continue their athletic activity, 71 percent said the operation improved their ability, and half were participating in the sport more frequently after the surgery than before it.

Just four procedures were performed after the initial surgery, suggesting that the new joints functioned well even with repetitive activities such as swimming, the researchers note.

A new study says that 13 percent of American seniors suffer mistreatment from various forms of abuse.

The University of Chicago researchers said the chief forms were verbal abuse (9 percent), being taken advantage of financially (3.5 percent), and physical abuse (0.2 percent). The team also found that seniors with physical impairments were most likely to suffer verbal abuse.

“Older people with any physical vulnerability are about 13 percent more likely than those without one to report verbal mistreatment, but are not more likely to report financial mistreatment,” study co-author Linda Waite, a professor of sociology, said in a university news release.

The analysis of national survey data from 3,005 community-dwelling adults, ages 57 to 85, also found that adults in their late 50s and 60s are more likely to report verbal or financial mistreatment than those who are older.

“Perhaps the respondents are including fairly routine arguments, perhaps about money, with their spouse, sibling or child in their reports, or perhaps older adults are more reticent to report negative behavior,” lead author Edward Laumann, a professor of sociology, said in the news release.

Women were twice as likely as men to report verbal abuse; Hispanics were about half as likely as whites to report verbal abuse and 78 percent less likely to report financial mistreatment; and blacks were 77 percent more likely than whites to report financial mistreatment.

Of those who reported verbal abuse, 26 percent said their spouse or romantic partner was responsible, 15 percent said it was their children, and the remainder of respondents said friends, neighbors, co-workers or bosses were responsible. Of the respondents who reported financial abuse, 57 percent said a relative other than a spouse, parent or child was taking advantage of them.

The study was published in the Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences.

“The population of this country is aging, and people now live with chronic diseases longer. So, it’s important to understand, from a health perspective, how people are being treated as they age,” Laumann said.

People taking antipsychotic drugs are nearly twice as likely to have a stroke compared to those not on the treatment, British researchers reported on Friday.

The risk is even higher — about 3.5 times — for men and women with dementia, which means doctors should only prescribe such medicine to these patients as a last resort, the researchers said.

Previously, stroke risk associated with older antipsychotic drugs was unclear but the study published in the British Medical Journal showed both old and new treatments carry increased risk.

“The risks associated with antipsychotic use in patients with dementia generally outweigh the potential benefits, and in this patient group, use of antipsychotic drugs should be avoided whenever possible,” Ian Douglas and colleagues at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine wrote.”

The researchers looked at the medical records of nearly 7,000 men and women and recorded the incidence of stroke among those who at some point had taken antipsychotic drugs.

They found that they were 1.7 times more likely to have a stroke and that the risk was much higher if people had dementia.

The most common older treatments included a drug class called phenothiazine and the generic medicines haloperidol and benperidol. The most widely used newer drug in the study was Johnson & Johnson’s Risperdal, known generically as risperidone, the researchers said.

Other newer drugs in the study included Eli Lilly and Co’s Zyprexa, or olanzapine, Sanofi-Aventis‘ Solian, or amisulpride and AstraZeneca Plc’s Seroquel, known generically as quetiapine.

The researchers did not look at why people with dementia are at greater risk but one possibility may be that vascular causes of certain types of dementia may be involved, said Douglas, an epidemiologist.

“We don’t know why this extra risk associated with antipsychotics is even greater in people with dementia,” he said in a telephone interview.