He was hallucinating, dehydrated and undernourished.

“His facility for walking and eating…was diminished,” says Angie Moase, clinical co-ordinator at the Bloomfield long-term care home.

Bill, not his real name, came from hospital following a surgery at the end of October. He was on four anti-psychotic drugs, which was reduced to two by the time he arrived at West Lake. He was agitated and often wandered into other residents’ rooms. Staff knew it would take some work to help Bill settle into his new home.

The supportive measures team called on the expertise of the in-house physician to determine what medication Bill required. After reducing him to a minimal amount, chest X-rays and blood work were completed to determine if there were underlying causes for his delirium, says Angie.

“When you look at delirium versus dementia, delirium is a quick onset and something physical is behind it.” Because Bill was agitated and restrained, medication was what they looked to first, says Angie. She notes after the medication was revisited, they were able to employ other supportive measures interventions. Supportive measures involves employing creative techniques to address resident agitation and decreases the reliance on psychotropic medication.

The medication change itself helped Bill become oriented in his new environment and no longer require restraints. “He was eating properly, wasn’t restrained and didn’t hallucinate,” says Angie. Bill was also improving because he was eating an ideal amount of food and drinking adequate fluids.

A few weeks later staff studied the Welcome to Our Home orientation package at length and realized Bill worked as a miner earlier in life, which explained his early rising habits.

“We looked at the physical (health), the history and talked to his family,” says Angie. “He was slowly coming back to himself.”

Turns out, Bill is a rather pleasant man and not the aggressive character staff was led to believe he was upon his arrival. “(From) the information and history we got, we thought he would get explosive and really challenging.

“We uncovered he does have dementia. Because of supportive measures we know there’s a reason for every behaviour. Unless you do all of those things you’re taught, you don’t keep asking the question why. You take it for granted that’s the person you got.”

A psychogeriatric team from Kingston will be at West Lake Terrace to conduct an assessment. “They’ll support our supportive measures.”