One heck of a week.....Poor Mum had a heart attack last weekend, described by the doctors as 'minor' but she was in hospital for three days (Dad then said he wanted to take her home and the doctor said Ok ) on a medical ward. No matter how much you emphasise that the patient has dementia 'they' don't seem to understand! Talked to the nurse in charge and said we had brought Mum's drugs and when she needed to take them, emphasised they wouldn't like the result if she didn't and they would probably needed to approach her more than once to get them down her. Did they? Did they heck!!!! So poor old love was hit and miss with the Haliperidol, Diclofenac and Paracetamol and had no Matazapine at night at all. Result..........one very confused, in pain and extremely tired lady (after having a heart attack )who had no sleep, on the nurse's admission, for the two nights she was there. Plus they had inserted a canula into her hand when she was admitted, by the time we went up to the ward with her, she had begun to tug at it, so again spoke to the nurse and said if they weren't going to use it, it would be better removed. The nurse wrapped a bandage round it, didn't strapped it down with tape as we suggested, so guess what, seen with my own eyes on the nurse notes, Mum removed it herself......Arrgh! Whatever happened to the holistic approach, or is that only in fairy tales? I wouldn't be so angry if only nursing staff and doctors wouldn't say to me 'oh, don't worry we're used to coping with this'. NO THEY ARE D**N WELL NOT, THEY HAVE NO IDEA !!!! Don't get me wrong the treatment for the heart attack, particularly the paramedic, ambulance service and A & E was absolutely first rate, but it doesn't take much to spot that Mum has fairly advanced dementia, so why oh why can the ward not take notice of what a relative tells them?.
Mum has slept most of the week away since coming home and appears to have had a very big down turn in her health/demeanor. Understandable, but it has me extremely worried, can't help thinking that we've lost more of her this week than for a while now.
Plus this was the week when Dad had said 'can you get time off to look at nursing homes with me'? So as Mum has not been to daycentre and the sitter wasn't available, I've done this on my own. Depressing, some of the places I wouldn't send my cats for a holiday, let alone my Mum. I suppose in one way though at least I can spare my Dad looking at the worst of them, there's got to be a silver lining somewhere...........
Sorry for the rant, feeling low, fed up, upset and want to shut the real world out for a while
Mum has slept most of the week away since coming home and appears to have had a very big down turn in her health/demeanor. Understandable, but it has me extremely worried, can't help thinking that we've lost more of her this week than for a while now.
Plus this was the week when Dad had said 'can you get time off to look at nursing homes with me'? So as Mum has not been to daycentre and the sitter wasn't available, I've done this on my own. Depressing, some of the places I wouldn't send my cats for a holiday, let alone my Mum. I suppose in one way though at least I can spare my Dad looking at the worst of them, there's got to be a silver lining somewhere...........
Sorry for the rant, feeling low, fed up, upset and want to shut the real world out for a while
Last edited: