TUESDAY, Nov. 12, 2002 (HealthDayNews) -- Worries about memory loss are common among people aged 60 and older, but a new study says simple exercises to boost memory work and are long-lasting.
Researchers divided 2,802 subjects, aged 60 and above, into four groups. Three groups received different types of memory training and the fourth got none, serving as the control. All the trained groups had improvements in memory, problem-solving and concentration, the researchers report in tomorrow's Journal of the American Medical Association.
"Each person got 10 60- to 75-minute training sessions," says researcher Sherry Willis, a professor of human development at Pennsylvania State University. "It was done in small groups, most of the time at home, but sometimes in a senior citizen center or at a hospital meeting room."The multi-site study was called ACTIVE, for Advanced Cognitive Training for Independent and Vital Elderly.
The memory-training group learned strategies for remembering word lists and item sequences. They learned, for instance, how to make mental lists in categories, such as grouping all the produce on a shopping list together. They learned unique ways to remember, such as visualizing a banana on their head as they walked through the store. They learned how to read a newspaper story and remember key points so they could retell the story later.
The reasoning-training group learned that when solving daily problems or trying to remember routines or tasks, it helps to uncover the pattern. For instance, finding out that a bus comes every 10 minutes or on the half hour makes it easier to remember when you should be at the bus stop.
The speed-of-processing group learned to process visual information quickly, a skill needed to look up phone numbers, find information on medicine bottles and respond properly to traffic signals. Using a touch-screen computer, they indicated whether they saw a car or a truck appear and then, whether a car or truck also appeared on the outside edges of the screen.
After five weeks of training, 87 percent of those in the speed-of-processing group, 74 percent in the reasoning-training group and 26 percent in the memory-training group had shown memory improvement, Willis says.
And the improvement continued throughout the two years of the study, especially for the subjects who had "booster" training sessions.
"To get through the day, you need all three types of these skills," Willis says. "These kinds of skills are what show earlier decline" in many older adults.
The study demonstrates that intervention "can improve cognitive function in older persons," says Robert S. Wilson, a professor of neuropsychology at Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke's Medical Center in Chicago and a leading expert in the field. "The results [of the study] have been suggested by a number of smaller studies that were not as well-controlled, over the last 15 years."
The take-home point for older adults, says Willis, is that "they can force themselves, rather than to be mental couch potatoes, to use their memory." Besides enrolling in formal memory-training programs, they can stimulate their memory skills on their own, by doing puzzles, knitting and other self-help memory-boosting measures.
Keeping the memory in shape "is like physical exercise in that you have to continue to do it and you have to do what we call cross-training," Willis says.
What To Do
For information on forgetfulness, see the National Institute on Aging. For frequently asked questions on Alzheimer's disease, check the UCLA Memory and Aging Research Center.
