Pity your memory

A new study shows brain changes in Gulf War soldiers who are believed to have become ill from exposure to chemical weapons, and could offer insight into why they often claim they suffer from memory problems. The study appears in the online edition of the magazine on October 15 Clinical Psychological Science.

"To more than 250,000 military personnel, or approximately 25% of those who were assigned during the Persian Gulf War , they have been diagnosed with the Gulf War disease, "the study co-author said in a news release from the magazine. Bart Rypma, principal investigator of Brain Health Center at the University of Texas, Dallas.

"Although medical professionals have recognized chronic disease and often cause disability for almost two decades, the brain changes that uniquely identify Gulf War disease have not been found so far," he said. The disease is also known as the Gulf War syndrome.

 

Pity your memory

The brain changes that the study revealed were linked to "working memory," which allows people to store memories in the short term. Compared to healthy veterans, people with Gulf War disease performed tests of working memory more slowly than they examined accuracy, speed, and efficiency. The effectiveness worsened as the test became more difficult.

"The difficulty of remembering was the most common and inexplicable problem as a result of service in the Persian Gulf War," the study co-author said in the news release. Robert Haley, Chief of epidemiology Southwestern Medical Center of the University of Texas, in Dallas.

"This functional MRI study provides the first objective evidence that shows the exact failures in the memory circuits of the brain that underlie these memory problems induced by chemicals."

Rypma said the findings "support the existence of an empirical link between exposure to neurotoxic chemicals, specifically sarin gas, and deficits in thinking ability and neurobiological changes in the brain."

"Implementing interventions that improve working memory could have positive effects in many aspects of everyday life, from the ability to finalize a shopping list to matching names with faces, which would result in improved mood "he added.


Video Medicine: Poor baby Lori two times affect her head she lost memory, Pity baby Lori try to recall memory (March 2024).