We have been trying to get medication to reduce his anxiety but doctor reluctant to increase dosage. He is 88 with many health issues. From the minute he wakes up he starts phone calls demanding to go home. He makes nasty threats. He phoned police yesterday demanding they take him home. We get over 20 calls a day. Talking on phone or through window is not working. We can’t figure out if it is his hearing aid (batteries have been replace often) or he doesn’t understand. Or doesn’t want to understand. We have sent him letters and emails.
We have been trying to figure out how to safely look after him if he returns to his house. The stress is over the top for everyone. Any thoughts........?
My mom was kicked out, she was a danger to herself and others. She was moved from MC to a much smaller care home, ten residents instead of 25, more individualized care, better care and it was cheaper.
Do you want to share what medication? Even though we cannot diagnose or prescribe, many caregivers are aware that some meds can cause the opposite behaviors than the desired help needed to calm your Dad down. If that would be helpful to you.
Trust that there is a definite unmet need in your loved one, and it is stressful that he is suffering. And that you are suffering too.
When my neighbor went through this, he even called us all through the night! We could not take his calls, and turned off the phone. Turns out, after calling his doctor's office for help, and the doctor refused to test for an UTI (his staff knew nothing of the elderly symptoms of having a bladder infection, going only by their 'protocol'), this man did have a UTI.
How then did we find out? He was transported to the E.R. and tested. He had a UTI, and the behavior stopped soon after treatment. Be sure that it is not just a dipstick but a complete urinalysis with culture and sensitivity.
An elderly with a UTI can quickly deteriorate into sepsis and die.
The hallmark presenting symptom is behaviors! No fever, no burning on urinating, or the usual symptoms.
I would not be surprised that if someday the medical profession adds this to their list of UTI symptoms in the elderly: The patient is driving everyone else c r a z y!
With this much agitation, he may need to have his medication adjusted. This is done a lot by doctors who regularly treat dementia patients. Or a geriatric psychiatrist. Hopefully, they can find something that helps, but, I'd also keep in mind that sometimes, people who suffer with dementia are not content and they may stay that way until they enter another stage of the illness. I'd consider that he may not be repeatedly calling you due to insistence, but, due to the fact that he is forgetting. He forgets that he's already called you 10 times, so, he does it again.
I'd keep in mind that even if you bring him home, he may continue to insist on going home. He may try to leave his own home and behave in ways that make it just as intolerable there as the retirement home. His understanding is not likely to change and you may be no more able to appease him than the staff where he is. Plus, he'll need 24/7 supervision and that's not easy to do if he is resistant to care in his own home.
His Dr. may be worried of increasing his fall risk if he increases anxiety meds. Ask the Dr. what else he knows of that can be done to help him so he's more comfortable and not causing trouble for the workers, staff, others (you!).
Ask the retirement home people in charge and workers for their professional opinions how to help him because you like it and the people there, you'd like for him to stay there, and he has nowhere else to go. You want to work with them as much as possible so he's not asked to leave, and it sounds like they're at the point already. Hopefully, you can turn it around quickly. With this corona, all are on their last nerve.
Don't take all his calls; limit those to maybe 3/day. Try redirecting him to eat, nap, watch tv. Tell him of a show on tv to watch. Talk about anything other than home, leaving; positive things. If there are any activities that are still being done on a limited basis during corona, are there some that he might get involved in? (ask workers) Would workers take him for a walk around the building, inside or out? Take him his favorite things to eat..snacks, fruit, ice cream, drinks so he might get more comfortable.
You may need to get him a phone for the hearing impaired. If you do, you might want to make sure it's for the visually impaired, too, and dementia (pictures on big buttons to press button & dial person).
When was his last needs assessment? His dementia could have advanced to the stage that AL is no longer the best care.
I would not take him home.
I would request a new needs assessment by someone besides the facility that wants him gone.
I would tell him that he has to stay right where he is until (fill in with whatever will get his attention).
It is so difficult when they are basically being held prisoner in their rooms right now. I would want to leave if my only space was a small apartment or room and nothing else. So be patient with that, it is understandable.
I would be angry at the facility for wanting to implement more change in his upside down world. With this lockdown they should have expected behavioral problems and been ready and able to cope. It is probably time to look for a better facility that actually has the ability to take care of their residents. This place obviously just wants to be an expensive warehouse.