Ever forget where you parked your car or where you put your keys, and then you find yourself questioning your memory? Relax. That's actually a good sign, according to one new study.
Researchers say that people who go on to develop dementia actually may begin to lose their perception of their poor memory, between two and three years before the onset of the disease.
"Although there were individual differences in when the unawareness started and how fast it progressed, virtually everyone had a lack of awareness of their memory problems at some point in the disease," study author Robert S. Wilson of Rush University Medical Center said in a statement.
The study, published in the journal Neurology, analyzed findings from three studies involving a total of nearly 2,100 subjects over a decade or longer. The participants were an average age of 76 and without memory problems or cognitive impairment, at the start of the study. They were given annual memory tests and asked how often they forgot things and how their memory compared to where it was a decade earlier.
Over the course of the studies, 239 people were diagnosed with dementia. They all had one thing in common: their awareness of their memory problems was consistent up until approximately 2.6 years before the actual onset of the disease.
"Our findings suggest that unawareness of one's memory problems is an inevitable feature of late-life dementia, driven by a buildup of dementia-related changes in the brain," Wilson said.
So-called "senior moments" can be a subject of jokes but is also a real concern for older adults. If you're worried, you should look out for signs of forgetfulness that affect your day-to-day life, like repeatedly asking for the same information, needing to rely on memory aids, trouble completing familiar tasks or confusion about where you are or how you got there. These could be signs of Alzheimer's. You can find more information about the difference between age-related memory loss and dementia, here.
As for the new study, researchers say the findings emphasize the importance of family members looking for signs of dementia and helping the person get medical help.
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