 |
 |
All: My father is a 69 year-old Parkinson's patient, and has been on medication for over four years. He has been living independently with our mother, and doing just fine. Over the past two-three months, we had noticed an increasing amount of confusion that should have been a warning sign. This past weekend, he began behaving extremely irrationally, suffering from delusions, believing that he was being held hostage, among other things. We hospitalized him, and found out as he became lucid again that he had been systematically overdosing himself on Sinemet, because it made him feel better. As it made him more confused, he lost track of his meds, and complicated the problem further. Thankfully, this all appears to be just a major scare. It has been five days, and he is doing much better. (He says he had a dream last night, but it was just a 'regular dream'). The doctor is now working on managing his Parkinson's symptoms again, and hopes to release him shortly. We will find a way to better manage his meds, and have begun planning for a longer-term living arrangement. It appears as if this is an unfortunate but not unusual side effect of Parkinson's. Can we expect that he will return to the level of functioning he had prior to this medication problem? Any suggestions from those who have had a similar experience? Mark Klapper