Topic: Diagnosing Dementia Experience and Conversations with Doctors
2014-01-17 11:36:11
Posts: 11Joined: 0000-00-00 |
Share your advice and observations linked to your experiences dealing with doctors, nurses and other health care professionals who care for everyday health care needs. |
2014-01-17 11:36:11 |
Posts: 11Joined: 2014-03-09 |
One thing I learned quite quicky is that in the early stages of Mom's dementia, she was able to hide her problems very easily, so with each visit to the doctor, he wasn't seeing the concerns I was expressing. Rather than listen to me, he would quickly excuse it. By the time we got to the point he was willing to recognize there was a problem & get her on appropriate medication, it was too late. By that point, Mom was already in the fear of anything new stage. Had medication been discussed when I first started voicing my concerns, she would have been more receptive & things probably wouldn't have escalated as quickly as they did. |
2014-03-23 13:48:13 |
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Posts: 11 Joined: 2014-03-09 |
Our medical profession needs to step back & ignore the age of the person & listen more to what the primary caregivers have to say about what is really happening with their loved one. What the patient needs to hear is "you may have a form of dementia & we are going to do some further tests to try to determine if that is the case & possibly what stage & in the meantime, this is what we can do to help slow the process for you to help you live a longer, independent lifestyle". By starting the process sooner, their patients would probably be more receptive & willing to work with them & their caregiver to do whatever was possible to help slow the progression. |
2014-03-23 13:59:03 |
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Posts: 11 Joined: 2014-03-09 |
It is very difficult to have to start telling a parent or loved one that they are starting to diminsh in a mental capacity. Our process was very long & emotional. When talking with my mother's regarding my concerns I consistently heard "What do you expect, she is getting old". Each time Mom would reply, "See, I told you!" which lengthened the process far longer than it should have been for clinical diagnosis |
2014-03-23 13:59:46 |
Posts: 120Joined: 0000-00-00 |
Great Comments "Missing Mom", They really emphasize the need for early and accurate diagnoses and sadly demonstrate what happens when there is not accurate and early diagnoses. Sad to hear that these things happen. It also points to a strong need for continuous dementia education for the medical community across the board. Thanks for sharing. |
2014-03-24 13:49:24 |
