Is it common to have hallucinations with Alzheimer's?

[Katebright]

My mom, who's 80, insists that she saw a grizzly bear in her suburban backyard yesterday. What's the best way to handle hallucinations?

I have asked the same here and got several answers
http://www.caring.com/questions/alzheimers-hallucinations

But i thought ill ask here as it is a dedicated to Alzheimer's
only has any body have heard of it or experienced it.

Thanks

 

[Grannie G]

Hello Kate

My husband has hallucinations but fortunately sees people rather than animals.
I don`t know if there`s a right or wrong way to handle them. I ask my husband if he knows the person he sees and if he`s frightened. He is never frightened. If the person is still there, I try to distract him, take him into another room , if the person has gone I say `s/he`s gone now`.

 

[Nebiroth]

The short answer is yes. However, it may be a little more complex than that. It could also be a delusion - this is a false belief. Your mom may have a false memory of having seen her grizzly bear - she may or may not have actually done so. Almost anything can trigger these false beliefs, the chain of things which lead to them (for example, a picture in a book, or on television, or an old memory triggered by seeing something else, or a failure of cognition such as seeing something else and mis-identifying it) can be complex and make no sense, except to the person with dementia.

It is often very hard to differentiate between hallucinations and delusions, and of course, you can have both.

If your mom is pointing to an empty space and saying she sees a grizzly bear, then the chances are, that's a hallucination.

Claims of having seen one, may be more likely to be a delusion.

I believe that in Alzheimer's, at least, delusions are more likely than hallucinations, but of course that doesn;t mean your mom isn't hallucinating.

The best approach would be - to take her claim seriously, but matter of factly. There's no point in trying to dissuade her or change her mind, for example saying "there are no grizzly bears here" won't work. Just assure your mom that she is safe from the bear (or whatever) and try to distract her with something else.

It might very well turn out to be a "benign" hallucination/delusion; so long as mom isn't frightened or distressed by thoughts that the bear is damaging thing, or might get in and attack her then little more than acceptance and assurance should be needed.

 

[Iainwh]

Hi,

In the last few years of my Mums life she was also hallucinating. we told her community nurse and her specialist prescribed her antipsychotic drugs. I think you should tell her nurse or specialist that she is having them and see what they say.

 

[Brucie]

Medication can cause hallucinations, and medication with alcohol more so.

Not the case probably for you, but always worth bearing in mind.

Many years ago, my Mum was on medication [not dementia related], she had a few tipples then saw her own mother, long dead, sitting on the end of her bed.

 

[Sandy]

Hi Kate,

Welcome to Talking Point (TP).

You might want to look at this recent article in the Alzheimer's Society magazine:

http://www.alzheimers.org.uk/site/scripts/documents_info.php?documentID=679&categoryID=200241&pageNumber=5

It makes the very good point that some people with AZ have difficulty processing visual information, particularly if they have underlying eye problems.

My father-in-law would often mistake shrubs in the garden for children - not as frightening as a grizzly (I'm originally from California and have seen real grizzlies ).

The point was also made on the caring.com site by another poster that some forms of dementia tend to have more hallucinations than others. Lewy Body dementia seems to involve quite a few hallucinations involving people and animals:

http://www.alzheimers.org.uk/factsheet/403

Take care,

 

[Margaret W]

I think the distinction between hallucinations and delusions is a fine point. I had it explained to me but never got the point. My mum used to see my (deceased) dad sitting in a chair in the living room. She used to hear him talk to her. The consultant psychiatrist tried to explain the difference to me, but I never got it. She said if mum actually SAW dad sitting there it was a delusion, but if she "only" imagined him sitting there it was an hallucination.

I am still not sure why it matters. Mum was upset by it, whatever title it is given. It was a major problem to us and very distressing, whatever its title.

Margaret

 

[CraigC]

Hi Kate,

If you pop "hallucinations" in the search tool as shown bellow, this should return a plethora of results.



In a nutshell my answer would be yes. Dad had quite complex hallucinations at the early stages, particularly when on Aricept. He had friends in the wardrobe mirror, Charlie was one of them if I remember rightly. The illusions became so vivid it was part of his reality. I remember mum getting very upset when dad insisted the she lay dinner settings for his friends in the mirror.

For dad the hallucinations were usually comforting, but for others they can be very disturbing. They stopped as his dementia progressed, and although it is hard to be 100% sure, I am think he does not get them at all any more.

Kind Regards
Craig

 

[Grannie G]

Dictionary definition...............
Hallucination when you see, hear, feel or smell something which does not exist, usually because you are ill or have taken a drug
Delusion when someone believes something that is not true

Example;
Hallucination My husband `sees` people in our house who are not there.
Delusion He believed his family was responsible for India`s space mission.

 

[Nebiroth]

I always looked at it this way:

Hallucination: the actual experience of seeing, hearing (etc, it can involve any of the senses although visual and auditory make up the vast majority) something unreal

Delusion: a false belief, which may include a belief of having seen, heard etc something unreal but not in actuality experiencing this

It is difficult to differentiate between the two because people with dementia may do both. Hence, it could be a real memory of having experienced seeing the bear (hallucination) or simply a false memory of having done so (delusion)

It could also be a case of mis-identification. The dementia brain is a bit like a switchboard with crossed wires. You get weird and irrational connections between things so when you see something and the mind "dials up" the memory to identify it, you get a wrong number.

If mom points at an empty space and says she sees the bear, then that is almost certainly a hallucination.

 

[Margaret W]

Well, I guess mum had them both. An hallucination that dad was sitting in the chair when he wasn't and a delusion that he had removed all the light bulbs. Either way, it was very distressing.

Margaret