Creative ways of dealing with Hallucinations

Hallucinations and some forms of dementia go hand in hand. We have all probably had an experience trying to deal with a resident who was in distress about something scary they were seeing that we simply couldn't understand. I once had a resident in a skilled nursing facility who would see ants crawling up the walls and birds flying on the ceiling. The interesting thing was, that sometimes he knew it couldn't possibly be real, and couldn't understand why this was happening to him, so it was quite distressing. He would put on his call light and tell us "they're back, get me out of here." Well for Dominic, we had it easy, we would get him up in his wheelchair, take him to another room, like the family room or dining room, and have a cup of chamomile tea then try again. Usually that would do the trick, if not, we just tried the same thing again. Unfortunately it is not always as easy as getting the resident out of the room.

One of my students told me about a gentleman she had in her facility that would start screaming bloody murder around 11PM every night, he would yell out that people are trying to break into his room. Not only was this distressing to that man, it was also disturbing to his roommate and other residents in the facility. The staff tried for weeks to figure out what was causing this hallucination and they finally figured out that it must be the room. The window faced the staff parking lot and around 11PM is shift change.

When staff would be driving in or out, the lights from their cars would shine though the blinds creating streaks of light and shadows that the dementia brain couldn't quite comprehend. Once they had this, pardon the pun, light-bulb moment, they knew the solution - blackout curtains! The next day they put some in and guess what didn't happen that night? That's right, the hallucinations did not occur, the man was able to get some peaceful sleep, and so were all the other residents in the community.

Another hallucination that seems to be prevalent is scary creatures, such as snakes, and other creepy crawlies slithering around on the ground. One of the students had to drive to the hospital in the middle of the night where her resident was getting some care because the hospital staff could not get the patient to calm down - he was disturbing the entire floor yelling about snakes on the floor. So Jen drive on over with her magical "snake spray" and the man calmed down immediately. What is this magical snake spray?

Well, just a simple spray bottle filled with water and a BIG label that says "Snake Spray." How creative? How simple? How genius! Jen left the spray with hospital staff and they were able to get the patient redirected and calm whenever the issue came up again. Another student of mine used the same trick, and put a few drops of lavender oil for the calming effect. She used this "bug spray" for a resident who would see creepy crawlies in her room. The facility had a few bottles of this around including one the resident could keep bedside, which helped keep her at bay most times.

Do you have any other creative ideas? Let me know!

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