My brother is only 54 and due to alcoholism had liver failure, he was blessed with a liver transplant. I thought everything would be great, going from a terminal illness to a life saving procedure. Yet since the transplant it’s like my brother has over night got dementia like symptoms, he use to have the best memory and brain and now his forgetful, gets lost, doesn’t know how to do normal things like operate his phone, things he use to be able to do he can know longer do. His extremely angry, violent, smashing and breaking things. The weird thing is one day he’ll be somewhat normal then the next day like his totally lost it. He can even recognise it by saying, I think I’m losing my marbles. His currently in hospital getting all the appropriate tests but I’m hoping someone has experienced something similar. This is killing me. 😢
3 Replies
Korsakoff syndrome is a potential consequence of alcohol abuse. Get him to his GP. They'll do blood tests but also look at specialist referrals I would imagine.
I assume he's on meds following the transplant? That can cause extreme behavioural differences.
Did he have any form of radiation treatment or similar prior to surgery?
And the biggest thing: is he actually secretly drinking or abusing pain meds? That would honestly be my #1 thought. Because if he's drinking or using, his new liver won't process the alcohol like the old one. The old one would have been used to huge amounts of alcohol, and you probably wouldn't even realise he was drunk.
With the new liver, he would get very drunk very quickly. Everything you've said sounds like substance abuse.
It could be his medication since the transplant but also alcohol can cause early dementia . I would say it’s the meds though, if this has only happend since the op. The poor guy. I hope he gets the right help in hosp and starts to get better again.