Alzheimer's: Essential Everyday Activities Impacted by Dementia - Essay Sample

Introduction

Alzheimer's is a condition that affects the mental state of a patient which then causes dementia. Dementia is a general form of memory loss and other mental abilities such as cognition and other executive functions of the brain. (Heneka, Carson, El Khoury, Landreth, Brosseron, Feinstein, & Herrup, 2015). This is a serious problem that interferes with activities of daily living of the patient. There are several most essential activities of everyday life. These activities may include communication, feeding, elimination of waste, hygiene, maintaining a safe environment, sleeping, movement, working and playing. Generally, Alzheimer's affects a patient ability to carry out those activities. This condition does not necessarily affect the very old as it can also affect young people.

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The following is a plan of care for a 72 years old woman who has this condition which has caused incapacitation to her. The patient's mobility is compromised because of the disease process and worsened by her advanced age. Collectively these two factors affect the movement of the patient. Generally, the client's health condition is not suitable due to the disease process and her advanced age. Her health status affects her ability to carry out her activities due to general weakness and cognitive ability. Her level of dependency is high as she requires to be assisted in carrying out several of her daily life activities. The client needs to be fed as well as being assisted to a bath. She also needs to be supported in ambulation to prevent other health issues such as susceptibility to the formation of thrombi due to being bedridden for long.

In respect to the following twelve activities of daily living, the patient has a high level of being assisted in meeting her need. The following are the twelve activities of everyday life according to health practitioners Roper, Logan, and Tierney: feeding, elimination, sleeping, controlling temperatures, mobilization, expressing sexuality, washing, and dressing, communication, maintaining environmental safety, working and playing and death and dying. (Haghgoo, Pazuki, Hosseini, & Rassafiani, 2013).

Most patients who have dementia are home dwelling. My client is also home dwelling; in this consideration, the patient should be enabled to remain at their homes for as long as possible. Holistic and individualized care for these patients should be made available. Individualizing this care is tailored to meet the psychological, social and physical wellbeing of the patient. In my plan for my patient, these needs are critical, and I will put into considerations on ways of maintaining the well-being under those health aspects.

Some problems that my client has are physical such remaining bedridden which increases the chance of getting thrombi, getting ulcers due to urine and fecal matter incontinence. Therefore, I will consider regular turning and maintenance of the pressure areas to ensure skin integrity. The patient also has psychological problems such as lack of proper ability of cognition as well as the inability to make decisions. Other psychological problems include anxiety, confusion, apathy, and irritability. (Sansoni, Anderson, Varona, & Varela, 2013). To take care of this, I will continuously reassure the client and her family. Teaching the family members about how to take care of the psychological needs of this patient such as being there to give her company and continuously assuring the patient would also go a long way to help her.

Socially, my patient is disturbed due to her irritability, anxiety and lack of proper thinking and reasoning often makes the people avoid these people. Inability to properly dispose of the waste tends to keep off the people as well as some family members away. This may affect their social life making them feel lonely. In my care for this patient, I will ensure a clean environment of the patient as well as changing her any time she messes. (Sansoni et al., 2013). Ensuring this cleanliness will make the situation tolerable for all the people who come to meet her. I will also teach the family members to ensure her freshness which in turn will welcome them to the room. Secondly, encouraging them to spend time with their patient will also be crucial. Making them understand that the patient's mental status makes them irritable and that they should not run away from her will encourage them to spend time with her. (Sansoni et al., 2013)Spiritually of the patient should not be overruled. They need to continue being spiritually relevant by this. I would encourage her to stay with her worshiping as well as requesting her religious leaders into the room to check on her.

The communication ability of this client is impaired. The articulation of her words is not proper, and this makes it difficult to understand this client. I, therefore, need to be conversant with the patient needs even those that she doesn't communicate. This patient needs to be assisted in bathing as she forgets and due to her generalized body weakness, she should be washed. The washing should be done in the bed and changing of the beddings done. Feeding is another critical activity of daily living. My client does not have difficulty in swallowing but needs to be reminded to feed and drink. To ensure proper feeding, the patient needs to be assisted in feeding. She, however, feeds well but leaving the food with her to feed might not work instead of helping her feed with the spoon and cup is most appropriate to ensure that she feed enough amount of food. (Sansoni et al., 2013)

Due to full confinement in the bed, and the inability of the patient to take herself to the toilet, the patient, therefore needs to be assisted in disposing of the fecal and urine. Most of the times the patient is messing herself, and as a result, the patient requires frequent monitoring to identify if she has soiled herself. Changing is critical in this case to ensure that she remains dry as the wetness caused by urine and fecal matter increases the chances of skin breakage which will cause more issues.

Later, it is essential to start training the patient to ambulate, start by assisting her move out of bed, followed by a few steps around the room then out of the room. Assist in simple exercises of limbs such as the arms to prevent muscle atrophy. (Sansoni et al., 2013) This can be achieved by moving hands in several directions yet carefully to avoid hurting. Training the patient to be independent is a significant move. This is by ensuring that the patient has an orientation of activities that take place at different times. The direction and coaching allows the patient to remember several events. After successful ambulation and positive gain od strength, you may find the patient asking for soap, reminding you to assist her bath and this is an indicator of a therapy achieving success.

Overall evaluation of the patients' response is crucial. Several skills will apply in the evaluation. Such skills include talking to the patient to identify whether she has a proper of time, date and place. You might realize the patient trying to remind you about an activity that you have oriented her to such as asking to be assisted in eliminating waste. More adjustments can be made following evaluation of the person on whether the goals you had set have been met successfully. Ensure active involvement of the patient's relatives and train them on how to assist their patient whenever she needs assistance. (Sansoni et al., 2013) Assess whether the care you implemented had possible threats to the safety of the patient. Make sure that the relatives of the patient are aware that Alzheimer's is a condition that causes degeneration of the brain cell which is irreversible. The family should therefore not expect that she should get better, but instead, they should expect variances from time to time.

References

Haghgoo, H. A., Pazuki, E. S., Hosseini, A. S., & Rassafiani, M. (2013). Depression, activities of daily living and quality of life in patients with stroke. Journal of the neurological sciences, 328(1-2), 87-91.

Heneka, M. T., Carson, M. J., El Khoury, J., Landreth, G. E., Brosseron, F., Feinstein, D. L., ... & Herrup, K. (2015). Neuroinflammation in Alzheimer's disease. The Lancet Neurology, 14(4), 388-405.

Sansoni, J., Anderson, K. H., Varona, L. M., & Varela, G. (2013). Caregivers of Alzheimer's patients and factors influencing institutionalization of loved ones: some considerations on existing literature. Ann Ig, 25(3), 235-246.