Observations placeholder
Hip replacement
Identifier
003655
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
This is a posting from wisegeek. …..What should send shivers up your spine is that this posting is from a medical doctor who seems totally unaware of the side effects of pain killers or the sorts of medication that they appear to be pumping into her/his Dad
A description of the experience
anon244208
Post 40
my 83-year old dad, is in hospital after surgery for replacement of the hip joint. ….
What I found to be a pattern with this psychosis is that it does not start right after surgery - this was the most bewildering thing for me: how come he was so OK, moving his leg, talking about how great a job the surgeons do these days and the first night four nurses could not hold him in bed?
The next days were the most horrible experience for me. My Dad adores me, I am the light of his eyes and has always been.
On the third evening, he became fully psychotic and for thirteen hours (during the night) kept talking about how "they" want to kill him, meaning the nurses and the doctors, forgetting where he was, telling me I should be ashamed of myself for not helping him, calling my mum names and at times crying "Help! Help!" when nurses had to give him his medicines.
The burden on the family is enormous! Mainly by not knowing what is happening and why he is deteriorating after being well. I am a medical doctor and was thinking all the time the way they teach us in medical school. Definitely during my time, there was no such condition as hospital psychosis.
The problem with my dad now is that, due to his mental condition, he is very weak and feels poor and going home is still impossible. But at least now I have a plan in time and some positive expectation about the outcome of this condition.