PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Imagine losing your short-term memory for anywhere from two to 12 hours only to have it return as mysteriously as it left.
This sudden loss of short-term memory, in adults who are otherwise healthy, is called “transient global amnesia,” and it is more common than you think.
People experiencing the condition may ask questions like “How did I get here?” or “Where are we?” over and over. When these individuals are taken to the hospital, tests to rule out stroke, recent alcohol or drug use, low blood sugar and a wide variety of other medical issues may come back negative.
Transient global amnesia affects about four out of every 100,000 of us. The average age of someone experiencing this is about 62. And men are affected slightly more than women. According to a report in the New England Journal of Medicine, the cause is still unknown.
Get more medical reports from Dr. Brian McDonough.
KYW Newsradio’s Medical Reports are sponsored by Independence Blue Cross.