Hello

Lafemme · Post by **Lafemme** » Wed Jul 20, 2011 1:13 am

Hello, everyone. I'm here in search of something that may help my mother with her RLS. She is 76 yrs. old. She recently spent a week on the psych ward because she was over medicated and was having hallucinations. The Dr. was able to help her and she was released last week, however, she is having a helluva time with her restless legs. I'm trying to find something that may help her while at the same time I need it to be safe for her age and her condition. She also has dementia.

Post by **badnights** » Wed Jul 20, 2011 2:34 am

Is there someone who can help her take the right meds at the right time? Has she been on RLS medication yet, and if so what kind?

RLS is very common in the elderly and is more severe in patients with lower ferritin levels, so be sure to get her ferritin checked : it should be over 50 ng/L and she should take oral supplements to get it up there if it's not.

Thank god your mothet has a diagnosis! There is no greater torture I can imagine than being at someone else's mercy, unable to explain what's happening, while experiencing RLS symptoms. If her dementia is advanced and she's unable to describe her condition, she should be watched for signs of worsened symptoms (augmentation) if she takes a dopamine agonist (the Parkinson's drugs). Augmentation is more likley if her ferritin is low, and it's a great torture.

You might want to ask Dr Buchfuhrer if he knows of any issues with the various RLS medications and dementia. He's an RLS specialist who answers questions like that. He maintains a website at www.rlshelp.org.

SquirmingSusan · Post by **SquirmingSusan** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 8:15 pm

You might get a list of all the medications she takes, as so many different classes of meds can aggravate RLS. And it sounds like she is, or was, on a lot of them. Who knows, if she had been on Requip or Mirapex, and then was taken off of them because of the hallucinations, she might be suffering from abruptly stopping those meds, which can really make RLS worse for a time.

Do you know what medications she was taking and what she is taking now? That would be really good information for us to know to be able to offer ideas, and also for if you write to Dr. Buchfuhrer, as Beth suggested.

Post by **Polar Bear** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 9:53 pm

I'm just thinking off the top of my head here, ............ if an elderly patient is unable to communicate regarding severity of symptoms but a diagnosis has been made, is there not a case of going directly for an opiate which is known to work for WED and forgetting about requip and the like which would have the possible issue of augmentation.

Post by **ViewsAskew** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 10:17 pm

Polar Bear wrote:I'm just thinking off the top of my head here, ............ if an elderly patient is unable to communicate regarding severity of symptoms but a diagnosis has been made, is there not a case of going directly for an opiate which is known to work for WED and forgetting about requip and the like which would have the possible issue of augmentation.

Sounds logical to me.