On Friday 13th February, my mum collapsed and had to go to hospital. She's stable but completely incoherent at the moment, due to a combination of a) having a Urinary Tract Infection (UTI) and b) discontinuing her anti-dementia medication last week in the (mistaken) belief that it was giving her hallucinations.
It's hard to believe just how rapidly mental function in an old person can decline due to a UTI, but mum had a Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) score of 26 out of 30 on Monday 12th January. It would have been 0 last Friday.
Normal Blogging will be resumed when mum's infection has been treated and she is back on her medication. I will be getting mum to use D-mannose in her juice in future, as this is effective against E. coli and Klebsiella.
Continued on A slight hitch, Part 2.
9 comments:
I hope her condition improves soon x
Very sorry to hear this mate, I hope she gets better soon!
Thanks all. She's not suffering in any way and her "obs" are stable, but she's saying words that don't make any sense. I'm getting her back on the Aricept today.
Sorry to hear about her problems. A while back my mother in law was annoyed with a cough and went to a MD for a cough suppressant. She reacted strongly and stopped her normal routine of morning coffee and walking. She just went down hill until I took her off the cough medicine and forced her back into her routine. She was back to normal in a couple of days. Simple things can have big effects.
I wrote an article on UTI treatment that might be helpful longterm:
http://womenshealth.suite101.com/article.cfm/cranberry_is_natural_uti_care
Good luck.
Mum's perked-up since Saturday as the UTI is responding to antibiotics. She's still fairly confused but she's now back on Aricept, so hopefully the confusion will reduce. I brought her loads of blueberries to eat as they contain D-mannose (amongst other sugars).
I've ordered a pot of D-Mannose Plus for when she returns home. I'm hoping that regular waterworks "flushes" will prevent further UTIs.
The tannins in cranberry, etc. can also be helpful.
Each level teaspoonful of D-mannose Plus contains 800 mg of Cranberry (vaccinium nacrocarpon) extract and mum also drinks tea. However, she does not drink enough and she will not drink any more no matter how much I nag her, which probably contributed toward her getting the UTI.
When I see her doctor tomorrow, I shall ask whether or not I can put Losalt in her salt cellar and Effercitrate in her fruit juice, as I use these and the Potassium content makes me wee a lot!
I have to self catheterise so was prone to getting UTI's. I found keeping my 25(OH)D status around 150nmol/l stopped further UTI's (and other infections).
Have you not been able to keep your mum on effective strength D3? It is particularly important for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's as it acts as an anti inflammatory and detoxifying agent as is neuroprotective, that's apart from the fact that people with higher D3 status tend to be less depressed and retain cognitive function and muscle strength better.
Mum has 5,000iu caps. Whether she remembered to take one every day, I don't know. The bottle is clearly marked "1 a day".
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