Transient Global Amnesia

What happens when a person suddenly loses the ability to form new memories—yet hours later returns to normal?

Transient global amnesia (TGA) is one of the most dramatic and mysterious clinical syndromes in neurology.

Typically occurring in middle to later life, an attack begins suddenly. The affected person becomes unable to retain new information and repeatedly asks the same questions, even though family members have answered them moments before. There may also be loss of memories from the recent past. Alarmed family members often bring the patient to an emergency department for neurological examination, blood tests, and brain imaging.

Then, usually within hours, memory function returns.

The patient is once again himself or herself—but commonly has no memory for what occurred during the attack.

In Transient Global Amnesia, neurologist Britt Talley Daniel, MD presents an extensive medical review of this fascinating disorder, drawing upon both his clinical experience caring for patients with TGA and an exhaustive study of the neurological literature.

The book begins with the early history of amnesia and traces the development of TGA as a recognized neurological syndrome. It then examines the clinical and scientific literature involving:

• Clinical features and history
• EEG and MEG
• CT scanning
• SPECT scanning
• PET scanning
• Sonography
• MRI, fMRI, MR spectroscopy, and MRA
• Diffusion-weighted MRI (DWI)
• Associated medical conditions
• TGA and cerebrovascular disease
• Recurrence
• Major review articles
• Proposed causes of TGA
• Clinical work-up and treatment

Particular attention is given to the important diffusion-weighted MRI findings involving the hippocampus, which greatly expanded scientific interest in the anatomy and pathophysiology of transient global amnesia.

The volume brings together 554 bibliographic references and numerous clinical and neuroimaging illustrations into a single detailed review of the subject.

Transient Global Amnesia is one of the few full-length medical books devoted entirely to TGA and, to the author’s knowledge, the only such book written by an American neurologist.

The book also contains a foreword by Louis R. Caplan, MD, Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School, who describes the monograph as a meticulous and thorough review of the reported cases, pathogenesis, imaging findings, and proposed causes of TGA.

Written especially for neurologists, behavioral neurologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, neuropsychologists, and other clinicians interested in memory and cognitive neuroscience, Transient Global Amnesia provides an unusually detailed examination of a remarkable neurological disorder.

A comprehensive medical reference devoted entirely to transient global amnesia and the neurological science of human memory.

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