I was called this week, asking me to go in to see if I could help obtain a urine sample from Mum and get her to eat or drink, as she had had nothing all day.
We have had a difficult week with Mum, refusing care, showering, dressing, eating,drinking,staying in her room, agitated, bordering agressive with staff & residents.....this is the way its been off and on for past 5 months.
They wanted to rule out a UTI, which shes already had 2 in the past 5 months, but she wouldnt cooperate one bit.
She refuses to use pads, and they have tried her with disposable underwear too.
Took me an hour of cajoling, and lieing, and being silly to make her laugh, but I managed to get a sample from her. Managed to get her to eat some of her meal, and drink some water.
Mums UTI test came back clear.
They had already tried her on Lorazepam, which first few weeks seemed to work, but then they upped the dose slightly as she was getting agitated again, and then she was falling asleep, and couldnt string a sentence together. They took her of Lorazepam, and increased her anti depressant. Seemed to work for 2 weeks alo, and now we are back to square one, so we have a review with Mental Health Nurse next week.
Mum is in residential secure dementia. Its my worst nightmare that Mum needs the equivalent of I think EMI in UK? We only have 2 places near to us. Neither of them, where we would like to see Mum spend her final days.