How Menopause Hot Flashes Affect Memory

How menopause hot flashes affect memory

Verbal memory is responsible for memorizing speech information - words and complex images. Its violations can manifest, for example, difficulties with remembering something. Scientists have established how impairments to this type of memory are associated with a common symptom of menopause, hot flashes.

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Verbal memory is responsible for memorizing speech information - words and complex images. Its violations can manifest itself, for example, with difficulty remembering something. Scientists have established how impairments to this type of memory are associated with a common symptom of menopause, hot flashes. The new study is published in the journal Menopause.

It has been previously shown that women with the onset of menopause have difficulty with verbal memory. In the new work, scientists used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to find out if there is a physiological link between hot flashes and memory problems. This made it possible to identify changes in real time.

Scientists performed functional MRI on 14 women, an average age of 53.3 years, who had regular hot flashes. The study was conducted when women took word recognition tests. Scientists were able to figure out which regions of the brain are affected during hot flashes.

“The data from preliminary research supports the concept of a link between objectively identified hot flashes and adverse events in the regions of the brain that are responsible for memory. The next step is to investigate whether hot flashes actually cause these changes in the brain and whether treatment for hot flashes helps alleviate these disorders,”said Dr. Stephanie Faubion, medical director of the North American Menopause Society.