Clearing the Fog in Nursing Homes

February 18, 2011

(via Alz. Daily News)

February 15, 2011, 11:10 am

By PAULA SPAN

The woman, who was in her 90s, had lived for several years at the Ecumen Sunrise

nursing home in Two Harbors, Minn., where the staff had grown accustomed to her

grimaces and wordless cries. She took a potent cocktail of three psychotropic

drugs: Ativan for anxiety and the antipsychotic Risperdal to calm her, plus an

antidepressant. In all the time she'd lived at Sunrise, she hadn't spoken. It

wasn't clear whether she could recognize her children when they came to visit.

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