alzheimersnotes.com re: Wandering Syndrome

Alzheimer's Notes, a blog on the net, discusses the wandering syndrome and has a survey that highlights an important subject.

The survey asks "Do you think Alzheimer's patients should wear electronic tags for ease in finding them if they wander away from home and caregivers?"

My neighbors told me about their mother, diagnosed with Alzheimer's, who wandered away from home and family, walked over to a busy street, and got into a car with tourists who could see help was needed.

The tourists drove the person around town while the Alzheimer's sufferer tried to remember where she lived. She was describing a place that was later identified as somewhere she had lived many years ago in another country.

Eventually they asked for help at a local small business, where fortunately the Alzheimer's patient was recognized, and could then be driven to the independent living section of a retirement home.

One of my teachers in a nursing assistant class told the story of her mother, who wandered away from the facility where the teacher was a nurse. She must have gone out through the locked doors when visiters were buzzed out.

Some neighbors several blocks away called the nursing facility because they came home to their unlocked house and found an elderly lady asleep on the couch, wearing a wrist bracelet from the retirement home. She had evidently gone for a walk, and when she was tired she found an unlocked house and a comfy place to lie down to rest.

To read some alzheimer's notes that cover everything from A to Z, you can click on the link for the site at the beginning of this post.