Delirium

What Is It?

We've probably all heared of a person being delirious, by which we generally mean that the person is a bit 'out of it', or not quite fully aware of what is going on.

In psychiatry, delirium is classed as including the following features:

  1. The person might float in and out of consciousness, meaning that sometimes they might seem fine and at other times unconscious.
  2. The person may seem to be really unstable emotionally, and can be anxious, confused, agitated or depressed.
  3. The person might have hallucinations (i.e. seeing or hearing things that aren't really there).
  4. The person might not know what the time is, or where they are. They might not be able to concentrate, or take on board things that people tell them. Their memory might be poor.

The good thing about delirium is that it usually doesn't last very long. Its severity also can fluctuate, sometimes it is mild, other times severe.

What Causes Delirium?

Delirium can be caused by a number of things, these include:

How Common Is It?

Lots of people experience being delirious at some point in their lives, indeed, of all the patients in hospital for physical reasons, 1 in 10 are seen to suffer from it.

Delirium is particularly common in older people who regularly suffer from physical problems.

What Are The Early Signs To Look Out For?

Delirium doesn't usually come on really suddenly. Signs that a person may be becoming delirious are as follows:

  1. The person may begin to seem a bit absent minded or confused.
  2. The person may begin to be irritable, nervous, or agitated.
  3. The person may become very sensitive to the level of light, or the noise around, and complain of things being too bright or too loud.

How Is It Treated?

This depends on what the cause is. The doctors usually try to find this out firsy by interviewing the patient themselves and any people that might be with them. They will also usually do a physical examination. This is known as an assessment.

After the assessment, the patient may be nursed in a quiet room. What is happening to the patient is usually explained to them, as they can be very distressed by what is going on. A low level of lighting is usually left at night, because being in the dark can increase a persons sense of disorientation, and they may be highly sensitive to normal levels of light.

Medication can be given. This may be because of the cause (e.g. a drip to rehydrate a dehydrated patient) or to try and lessen the distress that a patient feels. Pill that calm the patient down or sleeping pills may be given.

Does It Get Better?

Yes

In the vast majority of cases, delirium is only temporary.

We are creating a SimplePsych factsheet on Delirium which goes into more detail while still using easy to understand English. If you would be interested at this service being offered to you please let us know by emailing us Click Here

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*** RECOMMENDED BOOKS ***

If you are interested in going into even more depth, the following book(s), sold by Amazon.co.uk, are recommended by us. Each is followed by a rating for ease of reading (1-3).

1=Simple and Easy to comprehend.
2=More Complex but still a good read.
3=Very Complex, only for professionals/those studying to degree level.

Delirium: Acute Confusional States (Lipowski)

RATING SCORE = 3  Extremely comprehensive, excellent for students and practitioners, if you can afford it!

Delirium in the Elderly (Lindesay, MacDonald & Stark)

RATING SCORE = 3  For professionals only.

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