Should older person be told of MSA!

[Guest guest]

No particular opinion- but my mother-in-law and I were discussing this tonight.

My father-in-law died almost 2 weeks ago in hospice. We had the shy drager diagnosis about 2 weeks before he died. We did not share it with him. as we thought it would disturb him (we were still coming to grips with it)..but wonder now if we should have. He had started "going downhill" about 5 years earlier, and lost his only child suddenly about 4 1/2 yrs ago...Felt "not right" for a long time..but nothing his GP could put his finger on - tried to address the drop in blood pressure on standing and the urination difficulties... I think my father-in-law would have felt some relief in knowing that there was a reason for his decline at 81 besides old age. I took him to the emergency room once a few years ago when he was having urination difficulty - I remember the admitting nurse asking him what the problem was = he said "Well, I'm 79." - as if that answered it all, but of course it did not. I also wonder, if he knew, if he would have "fought" so hard to stay moving and active ...the day of his final "freezing episode" that led to hospitalization, he walked down the block and back by himself. .... His brain was succesfully donated to Mayo Clinic - even though we were not able to get in touch with the Clinic until more than 12 hours after his death. The researchers have sent a nice hand signed sympathy card to my mother-in-law. My thoughts are with all of you who are dealing with this cruel blow and all the caregivers. I think because we did not know, we did not give in to the symptoms like we might have, had we known. My mother-in-law feels she might have been more sympathetic (she was always kind and loving - but she did push him to do as much as he could for himself because she could not physically care for him at home if he could not move himself about).... who knows??

K.