Research shows that memory loss can be a very embarrassing situation that one finds oneself in, it happens all the time (Genova, 2009). Alzheimer's Disease is a degenerative one from which, at present, there is no cure. There are a number of drug treatments available which can slow the process down some, but none will cure the condition (Drug Treatments). Dementia is another condition which affects a person's memory, yet not quite as severe as Alzheimer's, it is still a great problem. Alzheimer’s Disease is a slow erosion disease of the memory from certain parts of the brain for which there is no cure and it is unclear what causes the brain to malfunction in such a manner, “it is like snuffing out the memories like candle flames caught between fingers”. [Connolly 2009] The Alzheimer’s Association (United States) has produced a 10 point check-list which outlines some of the signs to look out for in people with suspected Alzheimer’s disease. [Alzheimer’s Association]. This isn’t to say that just because someone forgets a name, place or appointment that they have Alzheimer’s or Dementia. Everyone has these lapses of memory throughout the years. A person shall forget things during adolescence then through ones’ twenties and thirties into middle age and then old age. When this happens and one is younger it is never considered that they have a memory loss disorder. No, this seems to be a conclusion that middle-aged people jump to about the elderly when they forget something. This is not always the case. If one is close to the person then it is possible that they see the forgetfulness on a regular basis but if one sees an elderly relative or friend only occasionally then nothing is thought about it.
The aging population are at most risk of developing some sort of memory loss. Alzheimer's Disease can be detected in individuals aged 65+ although it has materialised in people in their early 50s (Genova, 2009).
As the population of the developed world increases so too does the elderly. It is estimated that in the United States of America life expectancy has increased from 49 years to 75 years during the twentieth century. [Brawley 1997]. With the population of the world living longer it seems logical that there shall be a huge increase of both male and females who will suffer some form of memory loss. With new breakthroughs in medical techniques and the creation of enhanced drugs coupled with healthier lifestyles, people are living longer. This being the case, more people shall be diagnosed with some kind of cognitive memory loss.
Ms Brawley talks about ‘Wayfinding’ [Brawley 1997] where she refers to what people see and think about and how they navigate from one place to another. The person with memory failure must be able to recognise where they are i.e. in their room, dining room, day room etc. They must know where they are going to (their destination) and which route they must take to get there. This is a considerable task for one suffering these types of illnesses. One way to alleviate the dilemma for the patient is to have ‘Clues and Cues’. These may be colour orientated, whereby the person follows the colour of the walls back to their room. There may be visual images to assist them along the corridors of their residential home. It could even be the lighting or the sound of some recognisable piece of music. A combination of these sensory aids may be used to assist and therefore relieve the stress they may have encountered at becoming disorientated.
Cognitive psychology is the study of how people differentiate, remember, speak, think and problem solve. There are two ways to class cognitive disabilities: Clinical disability Functional disability Clinical cognitive disabilities include autism, Down Syndrome, traumatic brain injury (TBI) and dementia.
Functional cognitive disabilities include difficulty with: · Memory · Attention · Solving problems · Reading · Visual comprehension · Oral understanding
A person uses their memory for many different reasons but the main use of it is the ability to recall what they have gained knowledge of. Memory may be categorised as having three main parts to it: Immediate memory – where the person is using their senses to store what is happening around them at the moment. Short-term memory – where the persons stores what they think they shall require from the immediate memory area. Long-term memory – where the person stores relative information which me be required in the future.
Since all this processing is done in milliseconds or nanoseconds they are never aware of the process which is happening within their brain. The more meaningful the information is to the person then the more likelihood that it shall be transferred to the Functional memory area of the brain.
As people age and the onset of Dementia and Alzheimer’s disease become more prevalent their function to store immediate and short term memories becomes affected.
There are a number of electronic aids which are being pioneered in a number of European countries and also in America (Pullin, 2009). They help the sufferer to recall objects, events, faces etc and thus aiding communication between them and the Caregiver, family and friends. Dundee University is currently conducting research into how interactive devices may be used by people with Alzheimer’s disease. They have “Living In the Moment” (LIM) and “Computer Interactive Reminiscence Communication Aid” (CIRCA) programmes running in conjunction with St Andrews University and are currently looking for commercial partners to market CIRCA. [CIRCA] It is my intention to investigate this topic further and hopefully contribute, in some small way, to developing an application for memory loss sufferers.
With so much technology around today i.e. computers, ipods, ipads and mobile phones that can do almost everything from photos, videos, text messaging, surfing the internet, social networking to GPS. In some instances they have been known to make telephone calls allowing the users to speak to one another. Will this current generation of electronic mobile device users manage to use the new technologies of tomorrow when they are diagnosed with Alzheimer’s? Probably, but with the ease of taking photographs and the amount of images produced will these pictures have the same impact as previous generations when they look at photographs? In the pre-digital age the developed photos were cherished. They were categorised and put into albums where people could look at them, touch them and linger over them and tell you the stories of why, how, where, the occasion and what memories it conjures up about the image in front of them. It seems that nowadays it is ‘let’s see how many we can see before our attention span moves on’. What of the future for the current technophobic generation? This is one of the more difficult questions that need answering.
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