Temporal Lobe Epilepsy In Young Children

As a result, the brain has difficulty performing mental functions such as thinking and remembering.

Seizures or epilepsy are brain disorders where the person has repeated convulsions over a period of time. They’re episodes of disturbed brain activity that cause changes in attention and behavior. Seizures are considered the most common observed neurological dysfunction in children. They are very sudden intermittent episodes of altered consciousness lasting seconds to minutes and include involuntary tonic (stiffening of muscles) and clonic (altering contraction and relaxation of muscles) movements.

Epilepsy has many disadvantages, although there is no age limit when someone has Epilepsy. Epilepsy doesn’t have a huge effect on people’s

As mentioned earlier, memory was an evident theme in Caring for Kait and it’s a part of us that is largely affected by age. Older adults have more trouble with encoding information, as well as retrieving information, while their storage abilities stay relatively the same. With age, comes more tip of the tongue experiences where what we want to say is on ‘the tip of our tongue’, but we can’t quite grasp it (Maitland, 2017). Kaitlyn, after her first seizure, had experiences such as these and had trouble with encoding and retrieval of information. To help her regain her normal mental abilities, Travis would go through light mental activities with Kaitlyn (Ruhland, 2017). These activities would allow Kaitlyn to make connections between incoming information and information she already knew; this is known as linking and is a great rehearsal strategy (Maitland, 2017).

Much research has supported the fact that there is brain structure differences in individuals diagnosed with FASD (Nunez, el al 2011). Research into the brain of individuals has discovered abnormalities in the volume and thickness of the frontal lobes (Nunez, el al 2011). This results in impairments in attention, working memory, and executive functioning that can be traced back to the frontal lobes (Nunez, el al 2011). In addition researchers have also found smaller volumes of basal ganglia, which is a group of nuclei associated with motor control and learning (Nunez, el al 2011). Furthermore, caudate nucleus, which is inside the basal ganglia has also been found to be smaller in individuals was FASD (Nunez, el al 2011). Caudate nucleus is associated with mental flexibility and behaviour inhibition (Nunez, el al 2011). The hypothalamus, which is most responsible for its link with the nervous system was also found to be smaller in individuals was FASD (Nunez, el al 2011). Moreover, the thalamus was also found to be of smaller volume and is responsible for relaying motor and sensory signals to the cerebral cortex (Nunez, el al 2011). Luckily studies have also found that the hippocampus, which required for the formation of memories was left relatively normal (Nunez, el al 2011). The most affected area has been pinpointed as being the anterior vermis, located inside the

It is apparent that patient H.M.’s memory has not been affected by any general intellectual loss. H.M has severe anterograde amnesia, but surprisingly has spared implicit memory. Implicit memory is a type of memory in which past experiences aid the presentation of a task without mindful awareness of the experiences. There have been many tests conducted on the patient to test this spared memory.

Additionally, to further support these theories, researchers tend to conduct studies on the famous patient case, HM, to propose the consolidation deficit theory, in which those with amnesia cannot turn short-term memories into long-term memories (Dewar et al., 2010). However, researchers Dewar, Della Sala, Beschin, and Cowan (2010), mentioned that HM’s case does not fully explain why a patient with anterograde amnesia has the ability to get better at cognitive tasks despite being unable to recall having performed those tasks at a previous time. On the same hand, Duff, Wszalek, Tranel, and Cohen (2008) mentioned that most individuals with anterograde amnesia experience heightened intelligence, attention, skill, and reasoning levels (procedural memory).

Many human development specialists have examined memory loss of adults later in life. During the past fifty years, there have been many studies in children’s cognitive development and earlier childhood memory loss. Ernest G. Schachtel conducted studies on why people forget childhood memories as they grow older. He described the processes that could be involved in early memory loss (Crain, 2005). He was influenced by Sigmund Freud’s cognitive theory (Crain, 2005). Lev S. Vygotsky, however, described children’s early memory development as a holistic process that involved society, physiological, cultural, and economical environments. (Vygotsky,

Epilepsy is a condition in which an individual experiences recurrent seizures, all of which vary greatly. Caused by an occurrence of sporadic electrical surges in the brain, the categories of epilepsy are manifold. These seizures have multiple causes and treatment options and in the best cases, the seizure may be completely controlled. Epilepsy is one of the most common serious disorders of the brain affecting about 50 million people worldwide. Anyone could be diagnosed with epilepsy once they develop a tendency to have seizures.

Pediatric epilepsy is a common condition in the United States. Around 326,000 children experience epilepsy under the age of 15, and there are around 200,000 new diagnoses yearly (“What Happens during a Seizure”, 2014). The age of onset can begin as early as infancy and is most common during childhood. In some cases, there is no specific cause for epilepsy. However, the most common cause is a birth defect or developmental disorder. Those that have experienced head trauma, brain infections, or a minor brain injury can also lead to seizures, or epilepsy. The developing brain is more prone to seizures therefor there is a higher incidence in the pediatric population (“Pediatric Epilepsy & Seizures”, 2016).

Amnesia can occur in many different forms depending on the damage caused to specific areas of the brain. Korsakoff’s syndrome is a memory disorder that is caused by a thiamine deficiency and id usually seen by people with heavy alcohol consumption (Breedlove, Watson & Rosenzweig, 2013). Medial-temporal lobectomy is the cutting of areas of the anterior temporal lobe such as the hippocampus and amygdala and this can cause long-term anterograde amnesia (Salmon, Haymon-Abello, Connolly, & McLachlan, 2014). This paper will examine both Korsakoff’s syndrome and medial-temporal lobectomy to compare and contrast the similarities and differences between the two and how they can both impact a person’s life.

A fundamental aspect of human memory is that the more time elapsed since an event, the fainter the memory becomes. This has been shown to be true on a relatively linear scale with the exception of our first three to four years of life (Fitzgerald, 1991). It is even common for adults not to have any memory before the age of six or seven. The absence of memory in these first years has sparked much interest as to how and why it happens. Ever since Freud (1916/1963) first popularized the phenomenon there have been many questions and few robust empirical studies. Childhood amnesia is defined as the period of life from which no events are remembered (Usher & Neisser, 1993) beginning at birth and ending at the onset of your

Each type of memory activates a different area in the brain during recall. Working memory resides in the frontal lobe and lasts less than a minute. Short-term memory resides in the inside of the temporal lobe and lasts a few minutes to a few weeks before being erased. Long-term memory can last a lifetime though scientists are not yet certain which brain areas are involved in this function. Depending on the severity of disease related memory loss, a patient may satisfy criteria for either MCI or dementia. In recent studies it is found that inferior parietal lobe lesions are associated with short term memory loss and non dominant parietal lobe lesions produce impaired attention. Most of the current studies are in resting EC condition, comparing AD/MCI to controls. Some studies are conducted on EEG of MCI subjects in working memory task state have suggested the presence of compensatory processes in MCI subjects which enhances inter and intra hemispheric coherence in these

Case 1 tells the story of Henry Molaison (HM), a man with no memory. He lost his memory due to the operation of suctioned out the hippocampus to treat his epileptic seizures. At that time, it was not known yet that the hippocampus was essential for making memories. After operation, his seizures were significantly reduced, but Henry suffered a global amnesia. Owen et al. (2007) describes patients with global amnesia as perceptive and attentive but with a total loss of short-term memory and some trouble accessing memories of the recent past. Henry could not learn new things as he quickly forgot everything that he had learned. He could learn at a subconscious level only.