Denise is not always sufficiently lucid to understand her own best interests much of the time--though it would seem that she is starting to get better. They mentioned difficulties getting Denise to accept food, water, and medication. This is a familiar problem for people providing care to patients recovering from this kind of event, unfortunately.
So very correct. At times, because of strokes when the brain is "scrambled," patients suffer (hopefully temporarily as the brain tries to "repair" itself") from dementia, causing confusion, fright, delirium and even paranoia. My mom suffered and died from dementia (Lewy's Body Disease) and she experienced all of those symptoms. It was the worst when "sundown syndrome" hit. Fortunately and hopefully, Denise's brain will heal and the symptoms will begin to subside and eventually vanish.
Strokes are tricky things in a huge spectrum. My dad caught what he thought was the flu and most of it eventually vanished except for constantly feeling fatigued and it wouldn't go away. One day, my mom noticed one side of his face looked different from the other - it was very subtle and it took my dad a long time staring in a mirror to agree. He called his doctor. He told my dad to get to the hospital
now. So my dad did - of course, he drove. Turns out it was a stroke, albeit a mild one. He was kept in observation for a week in the stroke unit until he got cleared to go home. He spent the time, every night, playing poker and Sheepshead with the other patients. He asked the doctor why he had a stroke. The doctor replied: "Because you're old." My dad then inquired if he could have another one. His physician responded: "Maybe tomorrow, maybe never again." My dad lived for ten more years.
Gerard
