Did you know that depression can also cause memory problems? Dr. Lewandowski takes stock.
- Depression is a common illness around the world. The World Health Organization estimates that 3.8% of the population is affected.
- It considers that depressive disorders represent the leading factor of morbidity and incapacity worldwide.
- Since the Covid-19 crisis, cases of anxiety and depression have increased by 25% on the planet.
Depression does not impair any memory.
Often overlooked, memory problems are also part of the symptoms of depression. At varying degrees of severity, they can be particularly disabling in everyday life.
How is memory affected in depression?
While depression is of course marked by sadness, loss of vital momentum, or suicidal thoughts, attention and memory disorders, known as cognitive disorders, are also particularly present and contribute to maintain the recurrent negative ideas of the disease.
Indeed, memory is also built according to our emotions and the image of ourselves. When depression sets in, remembering our own history can be transformed by a negative view of ourselves. In this sense, depression affects our autobiographical memory and maintains a poor image of our abilities.
Memory problems also in the short term
Due to the loss of motivation and willpower, memory problems are also often associated with attention and concentration problems, which prevent the brain from carrying out two simultaneous tasks. It therefore becomes complicated for a depressed person to plan, reason or remember what he is experiencing in the present.
Thus, the care must also be access to this negative loop which alters the restitution of memories on his own history and on the daily life of the patient. To overlook cognitive impairment in depression is to slow down treatment.
Find out more: “Depression: How to get out of it” by Christine Mirabel-Sarron.
