From CBS News:A 2006 study questioned the acceptability of minor episodic memory loss in older adults as normal. Episodic memory loss includes things such as forgetting the name of a new acquaintance, a recent conversation, or an upcoming appointment.People commonly undergo an age-related slowing of the ability to retrieve information. They might forget where they put their keys, but they usually remember eventually. But when Alzheimer's is involved, new information is never properly stored, meaning the affected person never learned it well enough to be able to retrieve it.Related:Senior Moments: Signs Of Alzheimer's? CBS News. Posted at Clinical Cases and Images. Stay updated and subscribe, follow us on Twitter and connect on Facebook. (Source: Clinical Cases and Images)MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

Conclusion This study has some strengths, including the large number of patients followed and the long follow-up period. Furthermore, its clinical evaluations and assessments of cognitive function were based on validated measures. The participants also represent a broad spectrum of cognitive function, ranging from no impairment to dementia. However, the study also has limitations. It did not make adjustments for other factors (called confounders) which might contribute to the development of Alzheiner’s. For example, certain educational, social and genetic factors may have differed between the groups, which were not accounted for in the researchers’ analyses. Importantly, the assessment of cognitive activity was based on a composite measure. Since only seven cognitive activities we...

Dear Health Conscious Reader, People love this stuff, so in case you missed this… I have something that will electrify you… It’s even better than coffee. When I was hiking through the Amazon Rain Forest last year, I had a first-hand experience with a remarkable healing herb. This rain forest herb gives you lasting energy – without the crash. Sacred to the nearby Guarani tribe, it was literally a gift  the gods. According to tribal folklore, the Indians of the Amazon River Basin have been using it to prevent fatigue and increase physical endurance since before recorded history. I took it in the early morning before we hit the trail. After 18 hours through the jungles of Peru my mind was crystal clear and I had no feeling of fatigue. Looking back, I had covered 15 miles of rugged te...

Author Summary Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the leading cause of dementia in the ageing population. Symptoms include memory loss and decline in understanding and reasoning. Alois Alzheimer, who reported the first case of AD, observed plaques and tangles in the brains of patients. The plaques are made up of amyloid protein, while the tangles are of tau protein. One of the main scientific ideas about AD is that it starts with build-up of amyloid, which then alters tau protein, causing the disease. Another protein, called GSK-3, also seems to play a part. Simple invertebrates such as flies are useful for understanding human diseases. We have created an AD model in the fruit fly Drosophila where amyloid protein is present in the nerve cells of the adult fly; this caused the flies to be impaire...

Conclusions: A clinical trial is warranted to determine if ketamine anaesthesia during electroconvulsive therapy can lessen persistent retrograde amnesia and improve therapeutic response. Electroconvulsive therapy with ketamine anaesthesia may provide effective antidepressant action with minimal side effects. (Source: Journal of Affective Disorders)

There is a quiet revolution taking place amongst caregivers of those with Alzheimer's and dementia, and it's really quite simple. (Source: Disabled World)MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

Older adults are more likely to have destination memory failures - forgetting who they've shared or not shared information with, according to a new study. (Source: the Mail online | Health)

Conclusion: Results suggest that very long-chain plasma ceramides C22:0 and C24:0 are altered in MCI and predict memory loss and right hippocampal volume loss among subjects with MCI. These plasma ceramides may be early indicators of AD progression. (Source: Alzheimer's and Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer's Association)

Older adults experience 'destination amnesia' ...and over-confidence with false beliefs... (Source: Disabled World)

Elderly adults are more likely to have destination memory failures forgetting who they've shared or not shared information with, as per a newly released study led by Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute. It's the kind of memory faux pas that can lead to awkward or embarrassing social situations and even miscommunication in the doctor's office. Ironically, after making these memory errors elderly adults remain highly confident in their false beliefs........ (Source: Medicineworld.org: New Article Alert)

Older adults are more likely to have destination memory failures - forgetting who they've shared or not shared information with, according to a new study led by Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute. It's the kind of memory faux pas that can lead to awkward or embarrassing social situations and even miscommunication in the doctor's office. Ironically, after making these memory errors older adults remain highly confident in their false beliefs. The study appears online, ahead of print publication, in the Online First Section of Psychology and Aging... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

(Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care) I'm sure I told you that already! Older adults are more likely to have destination memory failures -- forgetting who they've shared or not shared information with, according to a new study led by Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute. (Source: EurekAlert! - Medicine and Health)

(Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care) I'm sure I told you that already! Older adults are more likely to have destination memory failures -- forgetting who they've shared or not shared information with, according to a new study led by Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute. (Source: EurekAlert! - Medicine and Health)MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

An editorial in the journal Lancet debates the problems of drug development for Alzheimer's disease. The feature questions why so many trials are failing at the phase 3 clinical trial stage and asks whether the animal models used prior to this are the most effective way to test the drugs. It also suggests treatments should perhaps start to focus more on the changes in the brain that happen before symptoms like memory loss start to appear. However, it notes that these are difficult to replicate in animal models... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)

A campaign urging people who are worried about their memory to seek help as soon as possible has been launched by the Alzheimer’s Society. (Source: Nursing Times Breaking News)

Patients with early-stage Alzheimer’s disease exhibit perceptual deficits in odour identification, often before the appearance of overt memory loss. This impairment coincides with the initial accumulation of pathological lesions in limbic olfactory brain regions. Although these data imply that odour stimuli may be effectively used as biological probes of limbic dysfunction, the precise neural mechanisms underlying the olfactory deficits in early Alzheimer’s disease remain poorly understood. In the current study, we combined functional magnetic resonance imaging with an olfactory cross-adaptation paradigm to test the hypothesis that perceptual codes of odour quality in posterior piriform cortex are degraded in patients with Alzheimer’s disease. In elderly control subjects,...

Most recent studies show that elderly people over the age of 80 often have mixed pathologies in their brains that account for their memory loss and confusion. Very few senior citizens have "pure Alzheimer disease"; therefore, this terminology should be used with caution. It now appears that vascular problems such as high blood pressure and diabetes can shrink the parts of the brain that control memory and can significantly affect at what age elderly people become demented... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

The Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation (ADDF) announced that it has awarded a grant of $240,000 to AgeneBio Inc. to develop a new class of small-molecules that have promise in treating amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI), a neurological condition that often progresses to Alzheimer's disease and affects more than 3 million aging Americans. Approximately fifteen percent of aMCI patients progress to an Alzheimer's disease (AD) diagnosis every year. In aMCI, new research has shown that excess neural activity is associated with greater memory loss and predicts progression to AD... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)

Production of new nerve cells in the human brain is linked to learning and memory, according to a new study from the University of Florida. The research is the first to show such a link in humans. The findings, published online and in an upcoming print issue of the journal Brain, provide clues about processes involved in age- and health-related memory loss and reveal potential cellular targets for drug therapy. The researchers studied how stem cells in a memory-related region of the brain, called the hippocampus, proliferate and change into different types of nerve cells... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)

Production of new nerve cells in the human brain is linked to learning and memory, according to a new study. The research is the first to show such a link in humans. The findings provide clues about processes involved in age- and health-related memory loss and reveal potential cellular targets for drug therapy. (Source: ScienceDaily Headlines)