Amnesia Flashcards

Flashcards for reviewing different types and causes of amnesia, and its implications for understanding memory.

Organic Amnesia

Pathological loss or impairment of memory, typically resulting from some form of brain damage.

Anterograde Amnesia

Impaired ability to create new memories.

Retrograde Amnesia

Loss of or access to old memories.

Declarative Memory

Explicit memory that you can explain.

Implicit Memory

Memory that is procedural or based on statistical regularities.

Medial Temporal Lobes

Key region for long-term memory encoding; includes the hippocampus and surrounding parahippocampal gyrus.

K.C.'s Retrograde Amnesia

Loss of episodic memories, but retention of semantic information.

Ribott's Law

Memories are lost backwards where older memories are stronger and younger memories are weaker.

Confabulations

Patients fabricate information to fill in the gaps of their memory; these are not lies, but the patient believes them.

Hypoxia

Low oxygen; hippocampus is often damaged, leading to anterograde amnesia; semantic memory often spared due to selective hippocampus damage.

Transient Global Amnesia

Temporary dysfunction to limbic-hippocampal network. Usually anterograde, sometimes also retrograde amnesia.

Alzheimer’s Disease

Progressive general neurodegeneration with atrophy of various brain regions over time; amyloid beta plaques and neurofibrillary tangles buildup.

Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE)

Repeated head trauma leading to damage, swelling, and neurofibrillary tangles; significant overlap with Alzheimer’s disease, but with earlier onset.

Korsakoff Syndrome

Chronic alcoholism causes thiamine deficiency, leading to widespread damage, especially to the mammillary bodies, causing both retrograde and anterograde amnesia.