Expert: Ronald Levy, M.D. - 5/21/2011

Question
I was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease in 1995.  In December of 2007, at the age of 38, my intestines ruptured and I had an emergency surgery for repair plus 2 or 3 subsequent surgeries that I was told were to "wash out" the area/my body.  I was sedated in the ICU for 4 weeks and also had a tracheostomy.  After the 4 weeks, I was brought out of sedation, but spent at least one week - maybe 2 - receiving IV pain medication as needed that would sedate me immediately.

3 months later when I was released from the hospital, I visited my surgeon for a wound and general check up.  He asked me if I was having any problems doing math.  I told him that as I was still recovering at home there wasn't a whole lot of math going on in my life and asked why he asked.  He said that sometimes after long term sedation that I experienced, patients may have memory issues with math.

Over the next year I found that I was having a difficult time remembering things that had happened during the few months prior to my hospitalization.  I have also lost a lot of my memories from my 4 month hospital stay, although I also remember a lot and those memories are very clear.

Cut to the present and I find - 3 1/2 years later - that my long term memory issues have intensified over time.  Trying to remember events from 10 months ago, for example, is often difficult.  Either I don't remember the event at all or I remember bits and pieces as if it happened 10 years ago rather than 10 months.  Often times when I don't remember the event at all, a friend will go over it with me in great detail and either I still won't have any memory of it or sometimes it kind of sounds familiar.

My question is, is this an effect of the long term sedation?  If so, am I correct that this would be permanent?  Could it get worse?  Any information you might be able to give me about this would be greatly appreciated and I thank you in advance.  By the way, funny enough, I have no problems doing math.

Answer
This is not an effect of long term sedation but more likely a result of long term hospitalization and chronic debilitation. It should not get worse and if you find that it does, you should probably get checked out to make sure there are no other issues going on (e.g. B12 deficiency). As for permanance, I cannot say. Memory is a function of association. If you lose the associations, you lose the memories. If you can reconnect the associations, there is no reason to believe that the memories won't return.

Ronald Levy, MD
Professor of Anesthesiology
UTMB-Galveston