There are several causes of memory loss. Although age is usually one of them, it is important to pay attention to other causes, especially when your daily life is affected by it. Information is stored in three different parts of your memory: the short-term memory, the recent memory, and the remote memory. Information stored in the shortterm memory may include the name of a person you met a few minutes ago. Information stored in the recent memory may include what you ate for breakfast today. Information stored in the remote memory includes things that happened years ago, such as memories of childhood.

Beginning in the 20s, one could begin to notice a change in his/her memory just naturally. Although the recent memory may be affected by aging, the short-term and remote memories are not usually affected in the process.

Memory is also affected by several problems including depression, stroke, head injury, and alcoholism. Dementia (such as Alzheimer's Disease) is a major cause of memory loss and requires medical treatment because it gets worse over time.

If you are forgetting things much more often than you used to, have trouble learning new things and making choices, handling money, or forgetting to do things you have done many times before, it is very important that you seek medical attention. A memory problem can become serious and start to affect your daily life.

It may be hard to figure out on your own, especially in advanced age, if you have a serious memory problem. In that case, you should talk to your family doctor who can listen to your concerns and offer further evaluation as needed to help determine the exact cause of your problem.

(source: Journal of the American Family Physician.)