![]() ![]() Unfortunately, acetylcholine is a key chemical needed for helping with the processing of memories, so if it’s blocked, you can end up with memory loss. Anticholinergics (which are what incontinence drugs are known as), prevent the involuntary contraction of muscles involved in urinating. ![]() They work by blocking the action of a chemical in the brain called acetylcholine, which is responsible for various functions within the body. These medications are used to treat people with an overactive bladder or urge incontinence (where you get a sudden urge to urinate and can’t get to the bathroom in time). These drugs are sometimes prescribed to people with restless legs syndrome. Parkinson’s disease drugsĭesigned to activate the signalling pathways for dopamine, a chemical brain messenger which aids fine motor control, occasionally Parkinson’s disease drugs (Dopamine agonists) can cause side effects such as confusion, memory loss, delusions and drowsiness. This is because the drugs block the action of a chemical brain messenger called serotonin. These drugs (tricyclic antidepressants) are prescribed for people who are not only depressed, but also suffer anxiety, eating disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder, chronic pain and some hormone related problems such as menstrual cramps and post-menopausal hot flushes.Īround 35 per cent of people who take tricyclic antidepressants report some memory problems, and 54 per cent have difficulty concentrating. However, they also dampen the signals linked to memory. They work by dampening signals within the central nervous systems that can cause seizures. These are prescribed to people to prevent seizures, but can sometimes be given for nerve pain, bipolar disorders and mood disorders. However, the knock on effect is that they also interfere with chemical messengers involved in long and short-term memory. Narcotic painkillers can affect memory because they stem pain signals by affecting chemical messengers in the brain. This may be the case, for example, if you suffer from a condition such as rheumatoid arthritis. People who suffer from moderate to severe pain may be prescribed what are sometimes known as opioid analgesics. They are sometimes used to treat insomnia and depression.Īntianxiety drugs (Benzodiasepines) dampen activity in certain areas of the brain related to the transfer of short-term to long-term memories. These are drugs used to treat different types of anxiety including agitation, delirium and muscle spasms. However, while statins reduce levels of bad cholesterol in the blood, they can also reduce levels in the brain, which are needed for the formation of connections between nerve cells. People take cholesterol-lowering drugs (statins) because high levels of cholesterol can lead to a hardening of the arteries in the body, which can increase the risk of heart disease. If you’re concerned about your memory loss, find out if there are alternative drugs or treatment options that can replace them. If you’ve started experiencing memory loss, it’s worth checking the list below to see if the medication you are taking could be the reason behind it.īUT REMEMBER! Never stop taking any drugs without the full knowledge and guidance of your doctor. This can either be because of a particular drug, or because of the interaction of that drug with another one. Further investigation of these forms of memory impairment promises to shed light on processes of human memory.Prescription medication can affect your memory. Accelerated long-term forgetting and autobiographical amnesia, which are invisible to standard memory tests, help to explain the discrepancy between normal test performance and prominent memory complaints among patients with epilepsy. Transient epileptic amnesia is an under-recognized but treatable cause of transient memory impairment. Further work is required to establish whether the interictal memory impairment is due to physiological or structural disturbance. ![]() The seizures respond promptly to treatment, whereas the interictal impairments generally persist. The seizure focus lies in the medial temporal lobes. It is associated with novel forms of interictal memory disturbance: accelerated long-term forgetting, remote memory impairment, especially affecting autobiographical memory, and topographical memory impairment. Transient epileptic amnesia is a distinctive syndrome of temporal lobe epilepsy principally affecting middle-aged people, giving rise to recurrent, brief attacks of amnesia, often occurring on waking. ![]() Recent research has established that this is indeed the case, and indicates that characteristic varieties of interictal memory disturbance co-occur with this form of epilepsy. Case reports over the past 100 years have raised the possibility that epilepsy can manifest itself in episodes of amnesia. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |