Kinds of Memory Loss

MayoClinic.com uses amnesia as a comprehensive term for memory loss. Memory loss can be temporary, a result of injury to the brain, a symptom of a mental health condition or the result of a disease. Concussions are the most common type of memory loss, and Alzheimer's disease accounts for 34 percent of Medicare's total expenses. Memory loss usually improves with rest and relaxation. Memory loss because of depression or schizophrenia improves with medication.

Concussions

• Concussion is usually a brief loss of memory after an accident or injury. Loss of memory --- amnesia --- is usually for up to two weeks before and during an accident or injury. One-third of patients with concussions suffer headaches, feel dizzy or irritable and cannot concentrate, but the symptoms usually dissipate with rest and relaxation. Organic brain syndrome is a short-term memory loss that might result from the accident or injury, and it takes longer to subside than concussions. Exercises, reading, crossword puzzles and other stimulating activities speed recovery from an organic brain syndrome.

  The Shipley Living Institute administers a quick test of vocabulary to calculate intelligence before an injury or the onset of a disease. Then Shipley Institute test part two's abstractions and puzzles yield an estimate of current intelligence or functioning. Before intelligence compared to after intelligence approximates the degree of the loss or deficit.

Mental Disorders

• Memory is an executive function, which includes ability to complete tasks, make decisions and plan and organize thoughts. Inability to complete tasks and organize thoughts is short-term memory loss.

  Depression is pervasive sadness with loss of appetite and inability to sleep with a loss of memory. Schizophrenia and schizoaffective personality disorders have a depression phase that precedes the psychotic phase of the mental illness. Depression and schizophrenia are both caused by excess dopamine neurotransmission.

  Depressed people recall negative unhappy experiences, which deepens the depression. Depression results in long-term memory loss. Lack of attention and inability to concentrate results in decreased retention of memories. Brain scans demonstrate that frontal lobe activity is decreased in depressed patients, and the neurotransmitter serotonin is decreased in patients who are depressed or schizophrenic. Memory loss is associated with increased dopamine and decreased serotonin.

Brain Damage

• Five million Americans suffer from Alzheimer's disease, which effects thought, memory and language. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that 5 percent of seniors 65 to 74 years old and 50 percent of those older than 85 years old have Alzheimer's disease. Medicare pays $91 billion annually for patients with Alzheimer's disease.

  Brain tumors are abnormal cell growth. Tumors cause neurological problems, including memory loss. Primary brain tumors originate in the brain. Secondary brain tumors originate in the body and spread to the brain. Brain tumors can grow slowly for years, causing no problems until large enough to compress brain tissue and exert pressure on the skull, nerves and blood vessels in the brain.