Friday, September 26, 2008

Hot Flashes Have Been Linked To Brain Fog


Brain fog and hot flashes seems to be a common complaint of middle aged women. In fact 40 percent of women over 48 complain of forgetfulness and over 85 percent of menopausal women complain of hot flashes.

A recent study of 29 middle aged women with moderate to severe hot flashes suggests that there might indeed be a connection. The women were provided with monitors that measured changes in skin conductance during a hot flash. Hot flashes were recorded for a full 24-hour period, with the average number of hot flashes coming to 19.5 per day.

During this period, the study also measured memory performance -- the recollection of words, names, word pairs, paragraphs and stories -- using standard neuropsychological tests.

When researchers looked at the relationship between the hot flashes that the monitor picked up and the memory performance on the cognitive tests, they found a very strong relationship. The study showed that the more true hot flashes a woman had, the worse her memory performance became.
It seems that the hot flash-memory relationship is not all in a woman’s head. It’s actually a physiological relationship that can be monitored. Another factory which worsened the memory performance was lack of sleep. The women having the least amount of sleep before the study had the worst memory performance.

So ladies, this is good news. Be sure to get plenty of sleep and rest assured that your memory will most likely improve once your hot flashes and night sweats improve.


Photo by: HSmith Photography

2 comments:

Janet Spiegel said...

I'm glad to have this confirmed by science and relieved to know that I'll be able to remember anything past 30 seconds once the 'pause is over with. I'm not sure how many more nights I can spend with throwing covers on and off 30 times a night, with fan blowing over my bed and windows open, and sweat dripping off my nose at the mere taste of a morning chai tea. Very funny to those I live with, but somehow I just can't see the humor in it...LOL.

Anonymous said...

So true...so true! Now what did you say! :)