Hello everyone.
An overview of my brothers situation and my question:
After being divorced by his (ex)wife and put in a care home then into hospital, i have finally been given deputyship for my brothers financials & his medical requirements. He is 43 years old and has MS and dementia. I have now been able to get him transferred to a nursing home (having been discharged by the hospital) closer to where i and our parents/sisters live.
He was admitted to hospital due to being malnourished, chronic bed sores and refusing to eat, which led to rapid weightloss and illness. when the NHS agreed to fund his moving to a nursing home closer to us, he seemed to settle in well but has again been refusing food which has resulted in a peg being fitted.
The upshot of all of this is that his sores are not healing and despite the care and attention he is receiving, he seems to have given up and spends most of his time in the fetal position with his head to one side so he can see the television (he cannot operate the remote so has to just watch whatever is on until the carers or visitor can turn it over). he is barely audible due to his condition and this is also compounded by the dementia.
We are all trying to find ways to make his situation more tolerable for him and we are trying to encourage him to eat more, explaining that once his sores are healed we can take him out (with a nurse) to do what he used to love - attending his teams football matches (we’ve looked into booking a conference room overlooking the pitch so he doesn’t get cold etc).
We realy want to give him some quality of life and not just spend every day in bed and one way i have thought about is hiring a private physiotherapist (ideally with experience of MS/Dementia) to look at helping my brother with a view to once his sores have healed, attending a hydro-therapy pool at another nearby nursing home.
One other thing i have to take into consideration is that when he is moved i.e. turning him in bed, showering etc, he gets very frightened and lashes out at whoever is there (and occasionally accompanied with a string of obscenities) so i need to factor this in when looking at hiring a physiotherapist.
Can i ask if anyone on this forum has a similar situation and if physio has helped?
If you have any alternative suggestions they will be most warmly received as well.
kind regards
C