Mother taking wrong medication

[Lazingsundayafternoon]

My mother has been taken to hospital after taking the wrong medication at the wrong quantity and time . She is becoming increasingly confused, doesn't eat properly and is falling a lot. I do not know what to do. I don't think she is safe at home any longer. I have informed social services and her doctor. What should I do next?

I sort my mother's medication into morning and evening dosette boxes. She still gets muddled on occasions but it has improved things

Care assessment would be the next step. Can you get care in or can someone monitor her medication? Would a medicine organiser help? Sending hugs to you both x

Thanks, yes she definitely needs an organiser

will different organisation help her or does she need someone to actuallygive her the correct meds?

FIL’s meds are delivered direct from the pharmacy. They are sorted into morning / lunchtime / evening, and presented as a tear off, individually wrapped, packet labelled eg Monday 4 April - morning etc. This would work for someone who knows the day etc.

he has carers come in 3 times a day though, and this is one of their duties, to give him his meds.

My uncle’s medications (20+ pills a day…) now come in dossit boxes (might have the spelling incorrect). It was organised through the social worker and they now get delivered by the pharmacy or I pick them up but sure you can ask for them. Very helpful for elderly people who have it take a lot of different medications and get confused as to organising them and the timing of them.

It sounds as though she needs carers to go in ensure she takes the right medication and eats. My relative with dementia couldn't cope with the pill organisers because he was sure 'he hadn't' taken them and it must therefore be wrong. Plus taking pills on an empty stomach when they were supposed to be with or after food. Unfortunately as he refused to have carers at home after multiple incidents and resulting hospital admissions he was discharged to a care home - no further overdoses.

We got dosette boxes that the pharmacy made up for MIL when it became apparent that she was taking an entire day's (or more) of paracetamol and various other meds in one go.

We started with doing the splitting up of doses into a plastic organiser ourselves, but when it became necessary for carers to give them to her they couldn't unless they were in pharmacy packaging.

You can get an organiser you fill up yourself that has an alarm and opens the relevant flap at the right time. MIL was deaf and couldn't hear the alarm so didn't work for us. https://amzn.eu/d/06uEgTZU

My mother has carer going in twice a day - morning and evening, primarily to ensure she takes the correct medication at the correct time. We explored a lot of possible solutions with social services after my father died, but this was the only reliable course of action as she is severely visually impaired, loses track of time and struggles to get the medication out of packets or dosette boxes. .

She definitely needs something like a dosette box, possibly also carers to support taking them. However, some pharmacies have refused to keep making them as they are businesses and it’s a huge job for which they don’t get any funding. There are alternatives like the Pilltime delivery service. However, as she’s in hospital, ring the ward, ask to speak to the occupational therapist, and burst into tears in the phone at how unsafe she will be without support with this. Do not under any circumstances maintain a stiff upper lip. Let the professionals who know the usual routes in your area help.

After my DM did something similar Social Services insisted on taking over her medication and we now have carers going in twice a day to give her the meds. They handle everything from reordering to collection from the pharmacy. It’s kept in a safe so she can’t access it. She does have to pay for the carers but as we are in Wales and Social services deem it necessary there is a cap on payments. It works out for her roughly the same as Attendance Allowance.

We could have been lucky as she was receiving 6 weeks free care after a hospital stay at the time and it was due to the mix up that ensured Social Services decided that she needed ongoing carers.