Memory Description
Memory Lose Serious Condition

Memory Description and Senior Health

There are 2 main types of memory: Short-term memory and Long-term memory.

* Short-term memory involves recalling details that have happened or been given to you only very recently. Such details may include telephone numbers, names, or perhaps a shopping list.

The things you learn initially in your short-term memory have to somehow convert to long-term memory information in order for long-term memory to be made possible.

* Long-term memory recalls experiences from further in your past. Events when you were a child for example, what you did on a particular date, things you learned to do years ago…

There are also different types of long-term memory: Semantic, Episodic and Procedural.

* Semantic memory relates to facts you have memorized, e.g. names and places. * Episodic memory relates to different experiences you have had. * Procedural memory relates to your learning, e.g. how you drive or swim.

Memory also has 3 procedural steps: Acquisition, Consolidation and Retrieval.

* Acquisition - before information can be recalled it must first be learned and stored. Once acquired is stored in the nerve-cell pathways of the brain, otherwise known as your short-term memory. * Consolidation - nerve pathways are strengthened and reinforced creating a more permanent memory ‘file’. This process is where your short-term memory becomes your long-term memory, your long-term storage of information.

* Retrieval – information is recalled from those reinforced nerve pathways, your long-term memory.

Memory loss, deficiency and dementia

Memory and concentration problems are common with age, including difficulties in focussing and in maintaining attention. It becomes hard to ignore outside interference or noise and tricky to make sense of what you are reading, watching or doing.

Some problems are more serious than others. People with more serious memory lapses may be suffering from one of a series of conditions of the brain known as dementia, e.g. Alzheimer’s disease. Dementia affects your ability to carry out normal and usually easy daily activities.

A memory problem is serious when it affects your daily living and tasks you have performed a million times before that now seem more difficult or require more thought.

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