A terminal illness

Watch 3-4 episodes of House. That's all you need!

Does her illness need to be diagnosed terminal, then she dies suddenly instead of after a protracted illness as expected, or could she simply get sick and then die unexpectedly? Pneumonia, surgery complications (even from routine procedures), etc. all come to mind. Or a stroke/clotting disorder - she has one, seems to recover, but then another clot strikes and she dies. Or even an unintended side effect of an illness - maybe the meds to treat her high blood pressure cause a seizure, and she's in a car accident.

Altzheimers. Few people realize that it is a terminal illness and inevitably leads to death, not necessarily from the disease, itself, but from confusion, etc...associated with it. A person with Altzheimers is unpredictable, moody, manic, with both highs and lows. They can seem physically healthy right up to the end, when they accidentally overdose or wander off into the woods and expire. Sad, but true.

Anything connected to the liver or kidneys. Once they stop working you do too. The patient can be coherent, but weak and in pain until the liver or kidneys fail. If he/she is not on dialysis he/she will die in short order. If the liver stops, he/she will need a new liver immediately. If neither are available, they will die.

RJK said:

Anything connected to the liver or kidneys. Once they stop working you do too. The patient can be coherent, but weak and in pain until the liver or kidneys fail. If he/she is not on dialysis he/she will die in short order. If the liver stops, he/she will need a new liver immediately. If neither are available, they will die.

Click to expand...

Kidney failure leads to high urea in the blood, which causes paranoia and incoherency. It's very upsetting to witness. I know because my mother, four of her five siblings and their mother all died of this (Allport syndrome, which is rare but hereditary).

aneurism

Guess it isn't a disease, but certainly can be quick death

Post-surgery infection or bleeder. It can hit quick and the person can seem fine until it does.

Complications from diabetes that has not been well controlled can affect any part of the body or any organ. The effects of diabetes are cumulative and the damage occurs over time. My aunt went into the hospital to get her leg amputated and died of a heart attack.


Brian

Asthma. People can live with it and control it for years but once in a while an attack is fatal.

There was a lady near here that went to the hospital for surgery and died with staph a couple weeks later. They said she felt bad, but went ahead on a trip after a minor surgery and when she came home she made appointment to go in, but died over the weekend prior to her appt. I don't know that much about staph, but should be easy to look up.

ABekah said:

I need suggestions for a terminal illness other than untreatable cancer, specifically an illness where the "turn for the worse" could happen, and the person die within a couple of days. She needs to be at least somewhat coherent till death.

Click to expand...

How about undramatic, uncomplicated old age ... no specific illness, they just start out "feeling poorly" and then "go into a decline", "take to their bed", and a day or so later "slip into a coma" and "pass on" a few hours later. When she "goes into a decline" your family visits her. She's resting comfortably at home or in a nursing home, having 'taken to her bed".

Signs it is going to be terminal are there: loss of interest in food, a "not there" look in their eyes, talking about things long past, indifferent to surroundings.

Medically, what's happening is multiple organs all slow down their functioning at the same time, the person sort of fades away in couple of weeks or less. Massive medical intervention can prolong it for a few weeks, but if she's elderly, frail, and her family isn't shrieking DO SOMETHING (or if she has a living will saying "no massive interventions) it's a quiet, peaceful death. On autopsy you don't find any single "smoking gun" cause of death, just a whole bunch of things that all happened at once and caused each other to get worse.

I saw these in ER - the family would belatedly realize that granny or grandpa was not just dozing, but unconscious or barely responsive, and call an ambulance. The medical history was always the same - the sequence above - and there's no medical interventions that work.

Does her illness HAVE to signify a terminal diagnosis (after all, living is a death diagnosis - we all live until we die - even merely of old age factors)? Can death merely be a possibility for her as one of the things that CAN occur if afflicted with her diagnosis? There are many diagnosii that ARE expected terminal - but some people afflicted STILL do not die for a very long time (and not from that illness). There are some people that are diagnosed with a mild or chronic condition that can be controlled or typically is not thought to cause death with/without treatment - but STILL some die. Anything can cause death in someone who's physiology does not support recovery or living with the disorder.

So, can she just be afflicted with some sort of compromise that CAN cause death?

Things that CAN cause death, can be lengthy (or not), can be sudden (or not), can be lived with (until cannot), etc:

Sleep apnea causes death (Jackie Joyner and Reggie White due to Cardiac Arrest prompted by a sleep apnea episode). Though in these cases - they are found dead - so may not fit story line.

Seizure disorders cause death - even mild cases or those who's disorder has been controlled for a long time (she could have seizure, be treated/released - then another acute attack kills her)

Viruses/flus cause death in people who cannot build antibodies/immunities (yet others get mild symptoms and don't even miss work/school)

Pericarditis affect young and old people (can get such from a trip to dentist for example) - again could be treated (with meds), released as "fine" and succumb to death when heart gives out a couple days later.

Heart mummers (that devolve into acute arrest situation)

Eptopic pregnancy (ruptured)

Misdiagnosed anything acute (appendix attacks missed - then ruptures causing septic shock/death).

Toxic Shock - though eventually leads to altered mental status (if not dying swiftly - I had this - coma/shocky for 13 days altered state. Still, some die swiftly)

Allergies cause death with exposures and can be fine until exposure

The list goes on and on.

I hope you find something that works!

Good luck,

Christine

Autoimmune diseases -- lupus, rheumatoid arthritis (which can have very nasty lung complications), MS, mysthenia gravis, etc. Flares can be deadly. The meds can also have deadly side effects, sometimes without much warning.

For that matter, if we're dealing with an elderly woman, heart disease is a possibility. My grandmother lived with congestive heart failure for decades before she passed away.

ABekah said:

The dying woman's niece (they are very close) lives out of state and is called home because her illness has gone from bad to worse, and she only has a matter of a couple days.

Click to expand...

That would work for the typical severe congestive heart failure - after diagnosis there is an uncertain interval before death. My uncle was supposed to live 2 weeks tops in CCU - he checked out of the hospital AMA because he preferred to die at home - and was very comfortable for 6 weeks and then died suddenly. But it was definitely a terminal diagnosis.

[/quote] Once the aunt and the niece talk, the aunt needs to die quickly, so the niece can get her inheritance and carry out her aunt's wishes.[/quote]

Remember the proving of the will, probate and all the legalities ...

Subdermal hemotoma that she does not know about but the readers are aware of? TIA's are, unfortunately, more common now. There's PDA\LDA (patent ductus arteriosis and latent ductus arteriosis), it can cause a plethora of problems in adult hood that can very much kill an adult. My son is a cardiac patient, he had a PDA. It can be missed in childhood and babyhood (it nearly was for my son).

Symptoms of PDA\LDA in adult hood and late childhood:
http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/350577-overview
Babies:
http://www.healthsystem.virginia.edu/uvahealth/peds_hrnewborn/pda.cfm

Ah, so she will be told she is critical and without much time as fact of scene, THEN needs die quickly. I thought it was more of a "surprise" she was ill (but basically fine) and now she is dead - and everyone just saw her and she was fine deal. Shocking type scene. But this is to be an expected type death after warning. Okay.

Emphasema (however spelled) - last stages in hospital on breathing machine
COPD as some mentioned - last stages
Organ failure (heart/kidneys) - a failure that disallows transplant due to her age or other bodily complications disallowing giving her heathy organ would be a really good one. Well, NOT good - but you know, good to work for your plot. Heck, could be she would succumb to death (based upon urgency of need) even if on list for transplant and no organ could be found before she passed. Without transplant? Prediction of time left would be somewhat accurate (within day/days). Once the organ systems are compromised to point she is near death, she would require equipment to assist her survival (which also tosses in a twist should you wish to use making the decision to remove her from life support as part of the plot). Or, even she could get organ for transplant surgery and your MC sees her before she goes in and she dies on table - taking care of same issue.

Sounds like you have something in mind and working - good luck!

Christine

I think the difficulty you are going to run into with this is with most chronic illnesses, the brain shuts down along with the rest of the body, thus making it implausible to have a conversation with the patient.

If it is liver/kidney failure, toxins will build up in the brain and the patient will be unconscious for the last week or so. Diabetes would most likely induce a coma.

Of all the choices presented, COPD/emphysema would be a good one. The patient develops bronchitis, is hospitalized, refuses to be put on a respirator and will die without it. She has 100% of her mental facilities intact and makes the decision herself. Thus, family are called in.

Keep in mind that you will only have a very small window to work with here. The niece would have to be there within a few hours, and that would be pushing it. (Family would not sit by and allow aunt to remain conscious as she slowly suffocates to death). The aunt would not be able to talk much (can't talk if you can't catch your breath, even with 100% oxygen running). You could consider adding pencil and paper into the mix for an extended conversation.

The niece could arrive, have their conversation, then aunt would be given morphine for comfort, which would make her unconscious (and actually hasten her death). She would die within a few hours.

It's also not uncommon for terminal patients to "rally" shortly before they die. A person can seem like they're taking an upturn, be happy, energetic, and then 12 hours later, they're dead.

What about sclerosis of the liver? My uncle died from it. As far as I know, there isn't a cure for it. It's most commonly found in alcoholics and drug users, I think, but I know several older women who are or have been an alcoholic. Many with sclerosis develop hepatitis c, jaundice as well as swelling of the abdomen. I wish I could give more information, but my uncle died when I was 8 or 9 and I honestly can't remember much more than that.