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Oct 2, 2008 7:18 pm US/Eastern
Retraining The Brain
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
If you've ever forgotten where you put your keys, you know a little about memory loss. But, imagine not being able to remember your family or where you live? It happens to thousands of people each year, but some are touting the ability to retrain the brain through memory rehab.
Local woman Kara Moore faced the issue after she got an infection delivering her second child. "When I woke up, I didn't know anything. I didn't know who my husband was. I didn't know my children.
Kara has trouble with simple things like remembering addresses and where things are in the grocery store. That's because the infection attacked both sides of her brain.
Neurologists are not sure what caused the condition. "We think it is related to some mechanism in which she created a defense, which is an antibody, but it reacted the wrong way," said neurologist Eduardo Locatelli.
Dr. Locatelli said cognitive retraining can help anyone since research shows challenging unused parts of the brain will help develop new skills at any age. "It shows that if you stimulate your brain, with using all the senses, it really seems to give power to the brain," Locatelli said.
Cognitive rehabilitation, or cognitive retraining, tries to retrain the brain to either develop the pathways to compensate for whatever may have been done, or find alternative pathways.
Kara has since been able to regain some of her memory thanks to the technique. Teresa Biber, her speech therapist uses several exercises to help improve Kara's memory including reading the newspaper to help her memory recall, and playing the radio while she tries to focus on something else.
Kara said the training has helped her recapture her life, slowly but surely. "It's given me a confidence that I haven't had," Kara said.
Some studies indicate the more active you are mentally, the less likely you are to acquire conditions like Alzheimer's or other forms of dementia. A few simple things to challenge your brain include eating different foods, listening to music you don't usually listen to, and reading books outside of your comfort zone.
Click here for more information or call 954-414-9750.
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