Abstract
We examined a patient with temporal lobe epilepsy, who presented unusual amnesic pattern without memory impairment, which manifested in a regular examination. Her ictal state was characterized by amnesia with brief period of retrograde amnesia following complex partial seizure. Anterograde amnesia came out only after four weeks later. Retrograde memory especially autobiographical content was severely disturbed for over twenty years. We interpreted these phenomenons as a result of consolidation deficit of long-term memory and an erasure of memory engram, which represented in neocortex following repetitive seizures. After medication, her anterograde memory deficit recovered drastically ; however, her retrograde amnesia did not improved. These results suggest that retrograde amnesia occurred as a nonreversible phenomenon. We think that the investigation of epilepsy and amnesia unlock the secret of memory function of human being.
