The care home and medication

I was reading in the press recently that a number of care homes have a bad record when it comes to medication for their residents. Let me say it was the complete opposite in the home where my relative was.

When she arrived there they looked at the medication she was on and had a talk with me. Basically she had been put on two anti-psychotics while she was in hospital after developing a bacterial infection. One was risperidone and there was another which I can't remember the name of.

The guy I spoke to said that he didn't think that she needed that type of medication and that they didn't like people being on risperidone anyway as it tended to make them agitated. The home's policy is anyway to try not to let medication infere with quality of life. They prefer to interact with their residents rather than have them heavily medicated.

I came back to the flat and went on to the internet to see what I could fine out something about the medication she was on. What I found appalled me.

First of all I discovered that risperidone was contraindicated in cases of Parkinson's Disease because it can mimic the symptoms of the disease and make them worse.

Then I discoverd that anti psychotics were best not prescribed where people have Lewy Body's Dementia because they can cause further damage and worse.

I was back over the home in ten minutes and they sorted out the problem quickly.

Strange: or, not so strange: Even with Lewy Body's dementia where visual hallucinations are common, she stopped seeing animals and children around the place soon after being taken off the medication and other things improved as well.

I'd hoped that things would improve enough for her to be able to leave, but they didn't. And I'll never know if it was the time she spent on the medication or the infection she developed that caused her to go to hospital that made her worse.

One of the reasons I'd decided to stay was that I'd had to rush up from London one day because she was ill, paramedics had been called and had recommended that a doctor come round to assess her. She was left in the care of someone who had a mental illness and really couldn't cope with the situation. The paramedics had left around 11.00. I'd arranged things because I couldn't get in touch with her one morning. By the early afternoon the doctor still hadn't arrived and from what I could gather over the phone she was very ill and couldn't get off the bed.

So, I rushed to get a train and when I got up here I found her semi conscious and delirious. The doctor hadn't arrived and it was getting on for five in the evening. Phoned the surgery and spoke to the desk and then to a doctor who had no knowledge of the situation. He checked it out and told me that the doctor the paramedics had spoken to had decided not to visit her but leave it until her own doctor came in the following day.

Just as when she had to go into the hospital before going into the home she'd developed a cold which had produced a bacterial infection. This is common with people in her kind of situation and something like this causes greater symptoms than in people who don't have her kind of problems.

The doctor who I spoke to came over straight after surgery and got her into hospital.

I'd been coming up and staying for periods of time. After that I decided to stay and be there for anything else that happened.