28 April 2022
 Categories: , Blog

If you're having memory issues, talk to your doctor and let them know. Your doctor may want to start by testing your brain with an EEG, blood tests, balance testing, sleep testing, or other types of tests that evaluate the health of your brain. Your doctor may also want to do cognitive testing and a brain performance test. Here are some aspects of your brain they may want to check.

Cognition

There are three common cognition tests your doctor may provide in the office: Mini-Cog, Mini-Mental State Exam, and the Montreal Cognitive Assessment Test. These tests involve doing different tasks such as identifying animals, remembering lists of words, drawing a clock, copying drawings, identifying common objects, and naming the current date, location, and president.

The results of the test let your doctor know if you're having cognition issues, and then your doctor needs to do further testing to figure out why.

Brain Speed

A brain speed test evaluates your working memory and your ability to focus and respond to things you see. This test involves solving simple math equations as fast as you can, identifying matching objects, or remembering sequences of numbers or objects. The test evaluates how many correct answers you get as well as how fast you enter your answer.

Pattern Recognition

Pattern recognition testing can involve simple pictures or complex designs. You're shown a series of images and then you select an image that would be the next in the series. Pattern recognition tests your ability to make sense of the things you see and recognize patterns from different perspectives.

Divided Attention Testing

This type of test measures your ability to divide your attention between two or more tasks and do them successfully. You might be given a test that lists the names of colors with the names being in different colored fonts. Then you're asked to go down the list and call off the colors rather than the names. This is called the Stroop test. For instance, if the word red is in blue font, you would say blue rather than red.

There are specific brain performance tests for certain conditions such as schizophrenia, dementia, or ADHD. Your doctor can choose testing based on your suspected diagnosis.

A brain performance test helps your doctor diagnose you and monitor your condition. Even if you're not currently having memory problems, you may want baseline testing and follow-up testing on a regular basis so you can monitor your cognitive health. You can find a brain performance test online, but consider taking one your doctor provides so you take the test properly and have it entered into your medical record for future reference.

For more information, contact a company like Midwest Brain Health.