Imagine
That! A Better Memory
Mental Technique
Helps People Remember
It
is tough enough to remember important daily tasks when you are young.
But for the elderly, forgetting something like a daily medication can
have dire consequences.
However,
the simple act of mentally picturing a future task is turning out to
be an inexpensive, easy, and highly effective way of making sure important
things get done, claims a new study in the journal Psychology
and Aging.
The
three-minute technique, called "implementation imagination," effectively
boosted a daily task rate by 50 percent in one group of seniors, researchers
report.
"You
can make things work better for yourself by doing this simple thing," says
Dr. Denise Park, psychologist and director of the Center for Healthy
Minds at the University of Illinois. "It's not hard and it's actually
sort of fun."
Everyone
has done it: You try and remember to pick up a quart of milk on the
way home from work - mentally repeating "get milk" over and over in
your mind. But on the drive home, that crucial stop at the grocery store
just does not happen.
According
to Dr. Park, the problem of forgetting important daily tasks only worsens
as you get older.
"As
you age, your ability to engage in what we call controlled or executive
functions declines," she explains.
Executive
functions involve deliberate, planned actions that are processed in
the brain's frontal cortex. Unfortunately, "the frontal cortex shrinks
with age, and these frontal processes become less efficient," Dr. Park
says.
For
the elderly, no daily task is more important than taking medications
that prevent or fight serious illness. Yet study after study shows patient
compliance with physicians' orders remains troublingly low.
Dr.
Jeffrey W. Elias, chief of the Cognitive Aging Program at the National
Institute on Aging, describes medical non-compliance among the elderly
as "a big problem, with some estimates suggesting that just 40 percent
of patients are compliant."
Identifying
Ways to Recall, Complete Tasks
Realizing
that reminder techniques that rely on the frontal cortex might not work,
Dr. Park's team looked for help elsewhere in the brain.
They
focused on "automatic" responses - mental activity triggered by visual
cues in the environment. Experts believe that while the frontal cortex
deteriorates with age, brain areas specific to automatic responses stay
relatively intact.
Testing
this theory, Dr. Park and colleague Dr. Linda Liu trained a group of
31 people over 60 to track their blood sugar several times a day using
a standard testing device, much like diabetics must do, although the
study participants did not have diabetes.
Study
participants were put into three groups - a "deliberation" group talked
over the reasons why daily blood sugar testing was a good idea; a second
"rehearsal" group recited the instructions for using the testing device;
and a third "imagination" group spent three minutes imagining themselves
using the glucose monitor within the home or work environment.
Drs.
Park and Liu then tracked blood sugar monitoring rates for the next
three weeks.
"We
found that if you imagined completing the desired act in great detail,
you're much more likely to do it," Dr. Park says.
Indeed,
participants in the imagination group remembered to take their blood
sugar readings at a rate 50 percent higher than participants in the
other two groups.
Visual
Cues Trigger Action
According
to Dr. Park, imagination works because it sets up visual environmental
cues that trigger action.
"For
example, say you know you're going to have orange juice every single
day with your breakfast before you test your glucose," she says. "Suddenly,
when you pick up the orange juice you go, 'Oh yeah, I need to monitor
my glucose.' This is a primed, automatic response originating in a part
of the brain that's more resistant to aging," she says.
Dr.
Elias agrees the technique should raise compliance among patients, noting
it has the advantage of being cheap and easy.
"I
don't think it's a very difficult thing to get patients to do," he says.
"A physician could write down the instructions by hand for them to take
home."
Of
course, the young and middle-aged can benefit, too. Other studies suggest
the technique helps dieters stick to healthy eating, assists women in
remembering to go for breast exams, and increases the use of medic-alert
bracelets by those who need them.
Dr.
Park even uses it to help her through her workday.
"Often,
if I have a paper to write, I'll imagine, 'OK, you're going to get home,
go up to your office, sit down, get your Diet Coke, read these articles,
and then start writing.' And it works. It's so effortless, and it makes
it much more likely to happen."
Always
consult your physician for more information.
Online
Resources
American
Psychological Association
Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
National
Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
National
Institutes of Health (NIH)
National
Institute on Aging
National
Library of Medicine
US
Department of Heath and Human Services
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July 2004
Imagine
That! A Better Memory
Identifying
Ways to Recall, Complete Tasks
Visual
Cues Trigger Action
The
Brain Plays a Role in the Immune Function
Creating
Vivid Memories Online
Resources
Other
Resources:
Find
a St. John's Mercy Physician
St.
John's Mercy Center for New Health Options
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Health Information
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John's Mercy Classes and Programs
The
Brain Plays a Role in the Immune Function
Researchers
have long known that different sides of the brain control language versus
visual and spatial functions.
Now, it appears
that different brain hemispheres have differing effects on the immune
system. When right-handed people had a portion of the left side of the
brain removed, they became more susceptible to infection, a new study
in Annals of Neurology says.
This finding
dovetails with previous research that demonstrated that people who had
strokes on the left side of the brain also tended to develop more infections.
"It means that
there are probably differences in the ways different sides of the brain
modulate the immune system," says Dr. Kimford Meador, lead author of
the study.
"It's similar
to the different roles the two sides have in emotions," adds Dr. Meador,
chairman of neurology at Georgetown University Hospital in Washington,
D.C.
Little is known
about the asymmetries of the human brain. Animal studies, however, have
shown a connection between different sides of the brain and immune responses.
Dr. Meador and
his colleagues examined the immune systems of 22 people with epilepsy
before and after they underwent surgery to remove small pieces of their
brain in an effort to control their seizures.
Patients who
had surgery on the left side of their brains demonstrated a decrease
in immune function, namely a reduction in the lymphocytes and T-cells
that fight infection.
Patients who
had surgery on the right side of their brains had increased levels of
lymphocytes and T cells. The changes were not related to alterations
in mood, stress, or cortisol hormone levels, the researchers say.
"T-cells and
lymphocytes had this diametrically opposite effect," Dr. Meador says.
This finding
may only be true for right-handed people, however, because the study
did not include enough left-handed and ambidextrous people to assess
the effect in them.
Histamine skin
testing revealed similar asymmetries. People who had had surgery on
the right side of their brain had a bigger allergic reaction on the
left arm.
A few previous
studies have suggested that people who have strokes on the left side
of their brain have lower T-cell levels. The new finding suggests these
patients may need to be watched more closely for signs of infection,
Dr. Meador says.
The next step
for researchers, Dr. Meador says, is to reproduce these results in a
larger number of people and to look at different components of immune
system functioning.
They also need
to discover the mechanism behind these differences. "Understanding that
might lead to new ways to approach treatments for different types of
immune disorders," Dr. Meador says.
Always consult
your physician for more information.
Creating
Vivid Memories
Even after you
have returned from a vacation, you may still fully recall the sights,
sounds, tastes, and smells of some of its particularly memorable moments.
For years, neurobiologists
have tried to understand the brain functions that enable this type of
detailed recollection.
A study in the
medical journal Neuron confirms previous models of
memory recall that found sensory-specific components of a memory are
preserved in sensory-related areas of the brain.
The hippocampus
(a part of the brain that has a central role in memory processes)
can draw on this stored sensory information to create vivid recall.
For their study,
the researchers mapped brain activity in human volunteers who sampled
different odors and viewed pictures of various objects.
Always consult
your physician for more information.
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