My MIL has dementia, not sure what type or exactly what stage it is. Anyway, yesterday she told dh that she thought she heard someone in the woods screaming into their fist and someone knocking at her door at 3am. She's told me before that she thought I was knocking on the door at 11pm one night and that she heard it three times. The one time she opened the door no one was there. I'm not discounting that she could have very well heard something and it could have been something causing those noises but are dementia patients known to hear sounds that aren't there?
Do these episodes always occur at night? Could they be dreams? Could she have a UTI?
Some people actually see ghosts. it is real to them People who are near to death will often see or hear dead relatives which can actually be very comforting. I personally don't believe these spiritual visitors are hallucinations. What to me are hallucinations are mice running up the fridge or bugs creeping over the floor. The patient is usually satisfied if you chase the mice out and stomp on the bugs. of course sometimes the bugs and mice are real but that is another story. That si my humble opinion I hope others will share their stories.
@Veronica91, I believe people near death see people too. My paternal grandmother, who died in 2011, told my great-aunt that she talked to my dad a couple of weeks before she died. He died in 2001. A week before her death, she told my SIL that my aunt, who died in 1992,(long before she and my brother ever met) told my grandmother that SIL was so pretty.
I'll probably get a better response from talking to the neurologist instead of her primary doctor.