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Dr. Andrew Rynne
MD
Dr. Andrew Rynne

Family Physician

Exp 50 years

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Suffer From Sleep Apnea, Memory Loss. Any Treatment?

My wife is 63 years old. She is showing signs of memory loss . We visited a nuerolgist and she said, that because she Sleep apnia she is experiencing memory loss. She doesn t believe it is the cause and won t take the treatment that was perscribed by the doctor. I am not sure it is either. She is sleeping 12 to 14 hours a day. Every time she wakes up her memory seems to be getting worse. Tonight she forget she wasfeeding the dogs 15 minutes after she feed them. She asked me we were having for dinner. I told her there wa lasagne in the frig. 5 minutes after I told her this she asked me what we were aving for dinner again. I feel so helpless.
Fri, 1 Mar 2013
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Psychiatrist 's  Response
Hello gsmithsiphone
Welcome to HCM

Sleep Apnea is abnormal cessation of breathing followed by disturbance in sleep, individual wakes and then resumes the sleep. It may be Central Sleep Apnea and Obstructive Sleep Apnea. Basically it causes multiple awakening in night and non refreshing sleep. Individual become lethargic, irritable due to the poor sleep. It is due to poor sleep he may have day time sleepiness and poor attention and concentration, which may cause memory impairment.
But as you have mentioned your wife is 63 years old, and she is experiencing impairment in Immediate Memory, basically in registration and recall. Immediate memory loss is classically seen in Dementias most likely in Alzheimer's dementia. So individual with this disorder tend to forget day to day things, he may have intact past memory but immediate memory is affected most.
As per my opinion kindly visit a good Psychiatrist and take opinion.
Thanks, Take Care.
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Internal Medicine Specialist Dr. Venkat Sivayogi 's  Response
hello,
as per the deails you have given it is case of sleep apnea with somnolence i.e excessive day sleeping. these patients generally suffer from memory lose . but at this age there are also possibilites of age related cerebral atrophy, and senile dementia.. so get done the CT head and consult sleep therapist and ENT specialist
hope this will helps u
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Suffer From Sleep Apnea, Memory Loss. Any Treatment?

Hello gsmithsiphone Welcome to HCM Sleep Apnea is abnormal cessation of breathing followed by disturbance in sleep, individual wakes and then resumes the sleep. It may be Central Sleep Apnea and Obstructive Sleep Apnea. Basically it causes multiple awakening in night and non refreshing sleep. Individual become lethargic, irritable due to the poor sleep. It is due to poor sleep he may have day time sleepiness and poor attention and concentration, which may cause memory impairment. But as you have mentioned your wife is 63 years old, and she is experiencing impairment in Immediate Memory, basically in registration and recall. Immediate memory loss is classically seen in Dementias most likely in Alzheimer s dementia. So individual with this disorder tend to forget day to day things, he may have intact past memory but immediate memory is affected most. As per my opinion kindly visit a good Psychiatrist and take opinion. Thanks, Take Care.