Is it too late for changes?

[jennyappleseed]

My 72-year-old mother had a brain bleed from a fall then suffered a massive stroke (center-right) during recovery after surgery. It has been almost two months and though she has made some improvements she still cannot answer questions consistently with sign language, cannot speak loudly or clearly, cannot move her left side. She is alert, but not responsive. It really is worst case scenario (minus that she almost died) and we are starting to lose hope for her to regain any normal functioning. I know each stroke is different and that each recovery is different. I was wondering if anyone had any stories or experiences of recoveries that were very slow, but eventually the person regained functions. We had a strange situation where when she was in ICU and her eyes were swollen shut and she had to be intubated for some time she was very responsive and quick with hand signals and could answer memory questions accurately, also. Once she was moved to less intense care and her eyes started opening her responsiveness basically stopped. No one, including the doctors, can say why they think this happened. I look forward to any responses to this post. Thanks.

[nostoppingme]

my mom had a rt side brain stroke on may 16th when she was in icu she was more responsive than she is now in rehab. i know what your going through it can be very discouraging at times and yes they do tend to forget about the non-responsive patients. hang in there recovery is slow for some but is possible. 15 years ago my mom had her first stroke and recovered completely but it took about a year i just hope she can bounce back from this one just as quick.

[jennyappleseed]

Thanks for replying. They gave her a ct scan once she entered rehab and there were no neurological changes/new events. They say this scan looked better and the blood was reabsorbing back into the brain. So, no one can account for her being less responsive except that maybe since her eyes opened her brain is now overwhelmed with stimuli. She may also just be fatigued from the trauma. She is on blood pressure meds, a blood thinner and other medications to stabilize her. Physically, she is very stable, but mentally she is just not responsive.

Our one big hope right now is that she still has to have a surgery to replace her skull bone (cranioplasty) which was left out for three months to allow the swelling to reduce and minimize more brain damage. They have told us that many patients tend to "bounce back" when this is done and become much more responsive. Scientifically it has to do with atmospheric pressure and the brain equalizing the pressure between the hemispheres once the bone is back in place which allows for faster, even blood flow, etc... It doesn't always make a difference, however.

I think a very stressful part of this is staying on top of the nursing home to actually give my mother rehabilitation time. They tend to "forget about her" because she is not very responsive, but we have been shown that she does make improvements, just slowly. It is frustrating and painful feeling like the "experts" have already given up on her.

[oc1dean]

Couple things, your comment -I know each stroke is different and that each recovery is different. - While each stroke might be different depending upon which parts died the point about each recovery is different is just medical nonsense because the research to determine how recovery works has not been done.
At two months this is very early in recovery, don't let them tell you she has plateaued, plateau is just an insurance term used to stop paying for therapy. As long as she keeps trying recovery can keep going, albeit at an incredibly slow pace.
Regarding the difference in responsiveness, I woul have your doctor conpare the scan initially done to a current one. She may have had additional strokes, you didn't mention what was being done to prevent further strokes, blood thinners for clots, blood pressure drugs for bleeds, clipping,glueing, surgery
Dean