Editing Retrograde amnesia (section)

{{short description|Permanent loss of long-term memory}}
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In [[neurology]], '''retrograde amnesia''' ('''RA''') is the inability to access memories or information from before an injury or disease occurred.<ref name="Hunkin_1995" /> RA differs from a similar condition called [[anterograde amnesia]] (AA), which is the inability to form new memories following injury or disease onset.<ref name="Lafleche_2017">{{cite book | vauthors = Lafleche G, Verfaellie M | chapter = Anterograde Amnesia |date=2017 | title = Encyclopedia of Clinical Neuropsychology |pages=1–5 | veditors = Kreutzer J, DeLuca J, Caplan B |place=Cham |publisher=Springer International Publishing |language=en |doi=10.1007/978-3-319-56782-2_1106-2 |isbn=978-3-319-56782-2 }}</ref> Although an individual can have both RA and AA at the same time, RA can also occur on its own; this 'pure' form of RA can be further divided into three types: focal, isolated, and pure RA.<ref name="Lafleche_2011">{{cite book | vauthors = Lafleche G, Verfaellie M | chapter = Retrograde Amnesia |date=2011 | veditors = Kreutzer J, DeLuca J, Caplan B | title = Encyclopedia of Clinical Neuropsychology |pages=2167–2170 |place=New York, NY |publisher=Springer New York |language=en |doi=10.1007/978-0-387-79948-3_1152 |isbn=978-0-387-79947-6 }}</ref> RA negatively affects an individual's [[Episodic memory|episodic]], [[Autobiographical memory|autobiographical]], and [[declarative memory]], but they can still form new memories because RA leaves [[procedural memory]] intact.<ref name="Lafleche_2011" /> Depending on its severity, RA can result in either temporally graded or more permanent memory loss.<ref name="Lafleche_2011" /> However, memory loss usually follows [[Ribot's law]], which states that individuals are more likely to lose recent memories than older memories.<ref name="Wixted_2004">{{cite journal | vauthors = Wixted JT | title = The psychology and neuroscience of forgetting | date = February 2004| journal = Annual Review of Psychology | volume = 55 | pages = 235–269 | pmid = 14744216 | doi = 10.1146/annurev.psych.55.090902.141555 | s2cid = 3057114 }}</ref> Diagnosing RA generally requires using an Autobiographical Memory Interview (AMI) and observing brain structure through [[magnetic resonance imaging]] (MRI), a [[computed tomography scan]] (CT), or [[electroencephalography]] (EEG).<ref name="Lafleche_2011" /><ref name="Reed_19982">{{cite journal |vauthors=Reed JM, Squire LR |date=May 1998 |title=Retrograde amnesia for facts and events: findings from four new cases |journal=The Journal of Neuroscience|volume=18 |issue=10 |pages=3943–54 |doi=10.1523/JNEUROSCI.18-10-03943.1998 |pmc=6793126 |pmid=9570821}}</ref><ref name=":0" />