How's your memory?

Are you over the age of 50 and wondering if your memory is as good as it was years ago?

Baycrest Health Sciences has created an online test to help seniors determine whether or not they need to see a doctor to discuss brain health. Memory experts have created this test, and made it available to help those worried about dementia or Alzheimer’s disease.

Canadians over the age of 65 are, on average, affected by dementia or Alzheimer’s and the risk will increase with age. For those 75 and over, the risk is 17% and those 85 and over the risk is 35%.

Baycrest says in a release that you can take the test on a desktop or laptop computer at home and receive an overall score of cognitive health immediately after you finish. This game-like test taps into memory and attention functions that are affected by aging and brain disease.

According to the test’s creators, those who are worried about the outcome of their test scores will be happy to hear that the majority of people will score in the normal, health range for their age. But for the seniors that score below average for their age and education, (approximately 2 – 3% of seniors) will be encouraged to re-take the test in a weeks time.  After a week, if their test is again below average, they will be provided with a personalized report to help start a conversation about brain health with their doctor.

A team of clinical neuropsychologist and cognitive scientists at Baycrest Health Sciences and its respected Rotman Research Institutes designed the online test and had lab-tested it with 300 recruited adults between the ages of 50 and 79.

The test – co-developed by Cogniciti Inc. – is free and available to everyone who has 20 minutes to complete it online. You can find the test online at www.cogniciti.com.

Looking for more information on dementia and Alzheimer's disease? You can download our helpful handbook for more information.

By: Julie El-Chaer