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Originally Posted by flatbutt
Hey gang, well Mom had hit a plateau of sorts and she was "stable" for a while. But her condition seems to have gone off of a cliff. I spent the day with doctors and a hospice expert. Mom has gone into that strange space, talking to phantoms or no one in particular. She has been refusing food and is currently hospitalized for dehydration. How that happened in a nursing home is a bit of a wonder.
I sat with her for about four hours today just watching her go in and out of wakefulness. She spoke just a few words but never directed at me. I think she was talking to my Dad (who passed 12 years ago). At one point she said "hurry up my father will be home soon!" I laughed out loud!
The elder care people want to put her on something called "routine hospice" which is apparently the step before end of life care. I'm her medical proxy and made sure that her DNR was known to everyone and that my priority is her comfort.
If there is any grace left in my life I hope it is used to ease her passing and may heaven forgive me that her passing comes soon.
Peace my friends.
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"She has been refusing food and is currently hospitalized for dehydration. How that happened in a nursing home is a bit of a wonder."
Seeing as how my 97 year old father is currently in the care of the "Catholic run Gold Standard of Assisted Living to Hospice Care that is tied to the largest Catholic run Hospital in the entire State of Mississippi" I can tell you exactly how that happened. Dementia patients tend to forget to drink water. The only way to tell if they are becoming dehydrated is to have Doctors orders for the facility to record their "dry weight" first thing in the morning every day before breakfast. Since water is some 8 pounds per gallon, that is what is being monitored. Now actually getting the facility to do it, or they aren't doing it because "the scales are broken and we are waiting on the maintenance person to fix the cable between the scales and the computer (HA!) is a whole nother matter.
In my Dads case, he recently wound up with chronic diarrhea. Again, he's 97. I told the Nurse Practitioner that this had happened about 5 years ago, and the G.I. outfit told us to give him Pepto-Bismol after every loose stool, gas X if he needs it, and start a routine of daily probiotics until they could get him in for a colonoscopy. That routine worked like a champ. The Nurse Practitioner fought back and insisted you don't give the elderly pepto bismol because it might cause a bleeding ulcer in the stomach. I told her so I guess we are going to let the man die on the toilet because he might get a bleeding ulcer in his stomach? It got to the point after 2 weeks of the diarrhea culminating in 14 loose stools in the span of almost 6 hours one evening. I went home very mentally troubled over all this, tossed and turned, jumped out of bed at 2 a.m. the next morning and drove myself to the emergency room of the "largest Catholic Hospital in the State of Mississippi" that is tied to the place where he was a patient, er, "customer". I showed the nurse in the E.R. the recently paid 8k monthly tab and ran my Dads situation past him. He (the nurse) said "IF he were my Dad, he'd be down here". Next day I told the facility to get him an ambulance, that he is leaving the "limited lifetime warranty department" and returning to the "mother ship". With some push back and me telling them they could call the Pope himself if they need Doctors orders to ship him out, he went in to the hospital for 3 days and 4 liters of fluid. Back to the "limited lifetime warranty department" he went after that.
3 months go by and we get the bill for the 3 days. More than $11,000, and his insurance company---the Feds----paid all but $126 of it. They wanted the family to cover the $126. So that's some damn nerve. The Catholic 501c3 Not for Profit Hospital connected to the retirement home got a $11,000 pay day atop the 8k per month....for not doing their job.
Sorry for the long story Brother, my heart goes out to you. You are a good son that can go on with a clear conscience that you did everything you could from here on out.