New York – No one who knows Justin Kaplan would ever have expected this. A Pulitzer Prize-winning historian with a razor intellect, Mr. Kaplan, 84, became profoundly delirious while hospitalized for pneumonia last year. For hours in the hospital, he said, he imagined despotic aliens, and he struck a nurse and threatened to kill his wife and daughter.
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Justin Kaplan thought himself besieged by “thousands of tiny little creatures,” he said, “some on horseback, waving arms, carrying weapons,” during his bout with hospital delirium last year.
“Thousands of tiny little creatures,” he said, “some on horseback, waving arms, carrying weapons like some grand Renaissance battle,” were trying to turn people “into zombies.” Their leader was a woman “with no mouth but a very precisely cut hole in her throat.”
Attacking the group’s “television production studio,” Mr. Kaplan fell from his hospital bed, cutting himself and “sliding across the floor on my own blood,” he said. The hospital called security because “a nurse was trying to restrain me and I repaid her with a kick.”
Mr. Kaplan’s hallucinations lifted as doctors treated his pneumonia. But hospitals say many patients are experiencing such inexplicable disorienting episodes. Doctors call it “hospital delirium,” and are increasingly trying to prevent or treat it.
If this would happen to a orthodox person we would already have proof of olem habu.
The hospitals are actually full of ghosts its true
i thought i was hallusinating when i saw the hospital bill….4500 fo an iv and an xray…gevaldick…i should get in that business…they didnt even find anythng.
money for notheng ad the chicks for free…
Even here in MMC when you tell them your meds, tell them the order in which you have to take them. When I was discharged, the nurse would not discharge me unless she gave me a NIGHT med at 11:00 am. The result was that it caused me to fall in MMC in the lobby causing damage. I had an argument with the nurse about NOT taking the meds but she was SMARTER than me. I went back upstairs on CRUTCHES.l The Doctor was not happy!!! The nurse!! She was blasted by several doctors when they took one look at me and the security guards!! Be careful!!
It happened to my mother about 4 years ago. She went in for pancreatitus .
She was delirious for over a week. It was terrifying to watch her in this condition. We sat and cried.
She later told us things she saw . It was unbelievable.
It’s very common, it happened to both of my parents. I believe the sudden change in medication routine plays a part. If you are the person who would likely accompany a parent or grandparent to the hospital in an emergency, do everyone a favor and familiarize yourself with the names of medications, dosages and what condition it is being taken for, even better, write it down to take with you and do your best to have the hospital staff communicate with you about what changes they are making in medication…..adding or eliminating or substituting.
As a neurologist, I have seen many patients with “alterred mental status” while hospitalized or in unfamiliar environments. Sometimes these are patients with some degree of early-onset dementia, who experience what doctors call “sun-downing”, i.e. worsening when the sun goes down and their sense of sight is impaired. Others experience hallucinations in association with the cocktail of meds they are prescribed.
It’s wise to try to always have a good friend, family member, or experienced aide at the bedside, to check for any atypical behavior and to request professional attention should such occur–including an evaluation by a neurologist when indicated.
Probably has to do with medications they give the patients…..many have side effects, including antibiotics. they give way too many medicines!