GYN Appointment

Cranddi · August 22

My 69 y/o wife is in stage 5 Alzheimer's. She has her annual GYN appointment coming up next month. She has declined significantly since last year and I have a couple of concerns. 1) Her personal hygiene has deteriorated and she resists my attempts to help and 2) She might not understand the purpose of the exam and become upset. Guys - does anyone have experience continuing to take their wives to these appointments? Ladies - are these appointments important enough to risk the potential issues they may cause?

tboard · August 22

Consider talking to her GYN doctor or her regular doctor. I well remember how terrorized my mother was. I was able to suspend all but her mammograms without having to make that decision myself. I should disclose that I am not a fan of a lot of the "preventative" care we are offered. So many decisions about our care are made by people without medical degrees who work for insurance companies.

harshedbuzz · August 22

@Cranddi

Does your wife have a history of gynecological cancer or atypical Pap smears in the last 10 years? If not, she may not need an "annual" gyn appointment. Current recommendations for a woman her age:

Over age 65, with past regular screenings and no abnormal results in 20 years, she can safely skip PAP smears unless she has symptoms like bleeding. Between 30 and 60, women with normal Pap smear needs them every 3 years.

The other piece to this is, if your wife is avoidant around hygiene, she's fairly advanced in her disease progression. As with any screening, what do you plan to do with the information? If an abnormal result came back, would you OK further testing? If cancer was found, would you subject her to surgery, radiation and chemo?

Sometimes women who are resistant to help from their husbands are a little confused in the moment around who he is and why he's doing this to her. You might try an in-home aide to help with hygiene. It might be useful to allow a few visits to establish some trust before getting into bathing.

Good luck.
HB

Quilting brings calm · August 22

With someone this far along, I wouldn’t subject her to an annual GYN appointment. I just had mine ( age 66). No PAP smear, but there was an internal pelvic check. Also breast manipulation to check for lumps.

I did take my mom to a female GYN because she was having an issue. She was in her 80s and stage 3-4 at the time. By the beginning of stage 5 we cancelled all doctors except her PCP and her pulmonologist. Mom just got so confused, anxious and frustrated by too many doctors and appointments.

FYI- Her annual wellness visit with the PCP didn’t involve any of the GYN stuff.

cdgbdr · August 22

As a 66 yo female, my pap smears and pelvic ended at 65 and I do have a remote history of problems. I'd call the doc and discuss and cancel unless there is a compelling medical reason. Good luck.

addy103 · August 22

https://alzconnected.org/discussion/73850/gyn-appointment

Why are you bothering with this exam? It seems uneccessary.

Rick4407 · August 22

At some point you stop routine medical appointments, physicals, etc, to just going when there is an issue. The shift comes to prioritizing quality of life over quantity of life. Hard decisions! Rick

Carl46 · August 22

When my wife was stage 5, I quit taking her to appointments of that sort. No gyn, no mammograms. When a person has a fatal illness, early detection of other illness becomes pointless. I still took her to get her teeth cleaned until she went into hospice.

Cranddi · August 22

Thank you all for the amazing support. My wife has no history of Gyn issues, so I will be cancelling this appointment.

tonyac2 · August 23

My DH is stage 6 and the only time he sees a doc is if something urgent comes up. And that’s right where I take him, Urgent Care. I’ve ended all of his medical stuff and he seems just fine. His heart doc said yrs ago that he shouldn’t be anywhere near a salt shaker. Guess what? Now he enjoys a little salt on his food, why not? He eats whatever he wants, which is far less than he used to. But I’m not going to aggravate him by running him around to a bunch of medical appointments. No way. I’m trying to help him enjoy his life as much as possible. Now, we do have to go see the neurologist next week because she can’t bring herself to prescribe Klonopin over the phone. I have no idea what good that will do, he can barely tell me what’s going on let alone tell a white coat. On we go.

GYN Appointment

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