Hospitalization questions

COred

How do you go about having LO hospitalized?  MIL has not been diagnosed because she refuses to go back to the doctor.  She has medications but refuses to take them.  She is constantly angry and yelling at everyone.  She has not become violent but it’s all day screaming some days.  At this point we’re thinking hospitalization may be the best route because they could do the tests they need to do to make a diagnosis and then also get her the best meds she should be on.  Thanks!

ETA…she has hallucinations and delusions which leads to some of the anger.  She’s convinced we switched her car and that I’m now driving her car (we disconnected her battery so she can’t drive so that’s a whole other anger issue).  People are in her house at night, seeing things that aren’t there and saying things happened that didn’t happen that have angered her.   Also depression and anxiety/

ElleSS

Depends on what state you are in.  I’m in CA and ended up having to have a psychiatrist put my dad on a hold as he presented a danger to himself.  We were going the outpatient route for evaluation until he tried to jump out of my car while we were on the highway.  That prompted the hold and formal diagnosis.  It’s hard- mine is also paranoid and non compliant with medication.

harshedbuzz

COred-

Dad was that rare individual who was diagnosed during a hospitalization; it was not a straight-forward process. I will describe in case it can be of use to you.

My parents retired and moved away so I saw them rarely and stayed with them 24/7 for a couple of days at a time which gave me a closer look at what was going on than most adult children would have living locally. I noticed the first changes in dad's personality as early as 2005 and significant issues with memory by 2008; I raised my concerns with my mother who blew me off until fall of 2015 when she agreed to mention to their doctor in FL where they spent the winter. Alas, she became very ill and almost died with him as her advocate so the plan was diverted. 

I flew north from that emergency and started to research my options landing on a Memory Center affiliated with the best hospital system in the metro area. They came north late that year because dad was diagnosed with a recurrence of prostate cancer; he seemed even more impaired to me so I made an appointment for him to be seen at the first available slot which was early November. My uncle was alarmed at dad's delusional talk over the phone and convinced my mother that he must've had a stroke or something. She took him to the local small town er which ruled out a stroke and sent him on his way with a referral to a neurologist scheduling 6 months out. In the midst of this waste of time, my aunt died and my mother insisted on leaving dad with friends checking in for a week while she went to New England. By the time she returned dad was in the middle of a full on psychotic episode so I had her get him into the car and drive 3 hours north to the hospital affiliated with the Memory Center. He was admitted because my mom's reporting suggested a rapid onset of confusion; the neurology resident thought Wernicke-Korsakoff's (which is a medical emergency) but the attending thought is garden variety Alzheimer's and discharged him to rehab for OT and PT with a referral to the MC in October.

IME, unless you have a medical need to be hospitalized, it is unlikely she will be admitted unless they turf her to a geriatric psych hospital which will likely titrate medication to calm her down but won't do a work up for dementia. Since your MIL is angry and carrying on, perhaps you could have her transported to the facility closest to you that has a geripsych unit. 

HTH-
HB