News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia by te0006 on Thursday November 14, 2024 @06:36PM (#42142467)
I wish this had come up on HN (or I had had that idea myself) some years ago when my mother suffered from that same cruel condition, for the last four years of her life. With her body, all her older memories and her considerable intelligence largely intact, she had multiple moments of clarity every single day, in which she fully realized the terrible and hopeless situation she was in. But of course, within seconds this thought and any decisions she might have derived from it dissolved in the black hole of her defective short-term memory. So she would not even have had the ability to take her own life to end this if she wished so. My brother and I tried many things to improve her life somewhat, only very few of those were actually a bit succesful. Two of them were digital gadgets, which we selected to provide some benefit without or at least with just very simple interactions: The best one was an LCD "picture frame" the only feature of which was to show an infinite loop of family photos stored on its SD card - she came to really like it and have it switched on quite consistently. The second one was an MP3 speaker which had a few hours of her favorite music on an SD card as well, and which could be used largely like a radio, just by pressing its play/stop button and volume buttons. This latter one she managed to enjoy at least from time to time. Best wishes to the author and his mom, and everyone in a similar situation.
Re:MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia by froh on Friday November 15, 2024 @02:14AM (#42144588)
interesting, however, from the article:

> Note: unless you have specific experience caring for someone who has amnesia but not dementia, please do not offer care suggestions.

> The patient

> In June 2022 the side-effects of a long surgery left my mom with permanent anterograde amnesia: she can no longer form new long-term memories. Memory isn’t just one neurological system, so very occasionally she will able to remember certain types of things. But for the most part, if she hears or sees something, a few minutes later she will no longer remember it.

> To medical professionals her condition looks a lot like dementia — amnesia is a common symptom of dementia — but she doesn’t have dementia. One difference is that (as I understand it) dementia is a progressive disease, while this amnesia is stable. There is no cure.

Re:MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia by fastball on Friday November 15, 2024 @03:11AM (#42144854)
I do not understand the relevance of the sections you have chosen to highlight here.
Re:MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia by matharmin on Friday November 15, 2024 @02:23AM (#42144623)
They did not say it was dementia, and they did not offer care suggestions - they merely shared their own related experience.
Re:MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia by IanCal on Friday November 15, 2024 @07:40AM (#42146363)
Outside of the fact that afaik they didn't, I would think this is intended to anyone who may contact the author as it is a personal blog. This is the comment section on a post shared by someone else as I understand it.