My 90 year old mother lives in assisted living and is having chronic vertigo/dizziness with vomiting. She went to the hospital on Monday and was given every test known to man, all negative. Meds were reviewed and her Gabapentin dose was reduced. She is still dizzy and suddenly incontinent at night; wets the bed in spite of wearing briefs. She was diagnosed with progressive dementia at the hospital.......I don't know if we're dealing with vascular dementia, Alzheimers, or mixed dementia. The biggest issue is the dizziness, which the hospital said was NOT vertigo, but the Physical Therapist at the ALF and the neurologist says IS vertigo. Meclizine is not effective. Anybody going through something similar who can offer advice?
I wrote down my experiences my book "Beating the Dementia Monster."
Good luck hope you have solved it for her. Its not pleasant.
Thanks to everyone for sharing. We are past 'this episode' for now, it seems, so I'm hopeful that with the reduction in Gabapentin and the ongoing PT, she can live a bit easier of a life. I did have a nice chat with her yesterday about the importance of wearing her eyeglasses and her specially made shoes, and she is compliant (for the moment). We also had a chat about being stubborn, and how it's not helping her to be so adamantly against using things designed to IMPROVE her situation! It's really tough being so old and so NOT in charge of one's own life, isn't it?
See if having your Mom sleep with more pillows or less pillows would help. Or if the pillow is feathered, she could develop an allergy to the feathers.
For myself, I need to have night lights in my room which help me a lot. I refuse to sleep in a totally dark room, if I wake up in the middle of the night, my brain gets confused about which way is up. That's from the visual vertigo.
Freqflyer: I am definitely going to talk to her primary care doc & PA about antihistamines and perhaps Flonase as well. She has chronic mucous in her throat, so maybe those would help. Thank you! The physical therapist at the ALF has given her the vertigo treatment twice; the first time it worked, she was feeling ok the next day. This time, not so much. She will get another treatment on Monday. Interesting about the visual vertigo and being triggered by stripes or checks. She has no patterns in her room. She seems to develop vertigo while she's sleeping (she sleeps on her back and does not roll over at all, according to her), which seems odd. She's always worse in the AM and then starts to feel better towards the afternoon hours.
So check around Mom's room and other rooms she may go into at the Assisted Living for these things.
So my Mom started to try over-the-counter antihistamines and that gave her some relief... but note there are quite a few different types of antihistamines... diphenhydramine is one of them which goes by the brand name of Benadryl... another one is chlorpheniramine which the drug stores sell under their own brand name. It was the latter that seemed to help my Mom. And there are other types of antihistamines. Check with Mom's doctor first.
If in fact it is vertigo, there is a physical exercise that can help but your Mom would need either a doctor or physical therapist to do this... it's a form of moving the head to re-position the crystals that are in the ear canal. Don't know if your Mom would want that at her age, but if it gives her relief, it would be well worth it. Just one or two sessions should help.
And it is amazing how many prescription medications can cause dizziness. I know you mentioned those were checked, I would get a second option.
I suppose that I would consult with a neurologist. Obviously, her symptoms must be very stressful and uncomfortable for her. I'd try to get her doctors to immediately prescribe something for her nausea.
Also, anyone who has ever experienced vertigo can understand just how miserable and disorienting it is, I can't imagine they could accurately diagnose any dementia under those circumstances.
There can be so many causes, you need to work with her regular doctors to try to get her some relief and to get her to the appropriate specialists.