Paranoia(9)

Tinakatrina

How do you handle it when your loved one has dementia related audio hallucinations? My dad is convinced there are people who want to kill him at the memory care facility he lives at. He can't tell me who they are. He hears discussions that don't exist. And yet seems so much more with it than any of the others that reside at the facility. It changes daily.

M1

Hi Tina, welcome to the forum.  I was taught that auditory hallucinations are always psychiatric in origin.  Visual are more multifactorial, but auditory not.  May need medication or med adjustment, particularly if they are unpleasant to him (most of these hallucinations are not pleasant in content).  Good luck---

towhee

It is hard when your loved one seems otherwise fine but exhibits beliefs from what seems out of left field. If this is a sudden change do check for a medication issue or physical problem. However the different dementias can have different symptoms and even with alzheimers you never know which part of the brain will be affected next. Another thing you might check is whether your LO is watching the news (murder, knife, gun, rape assault) or violent shows. PWD can lose the ability to tell the difference between reality and television and even the ability to realize that what they are watching and hearing is a television. Put that together with losing the ability to process everything they hear and the brains' tendency to try to make things make sense anyway, and you can get some pretty wild stuff. The problem is that once fear gets in there it is hard to dispel it and whatever is tied to that fear can hang around too. Hope things get better.