The daughter of an older hospitalized patient tells a nurse: "I am worried about my father. His memory is sharper when he is at home. He is forgetful, but is functional. Since he has been hos-pitalized his memory problems are much worse."
The best response by the nurse is:
a. "It is common for long-term memory to be more impacted by age-related changes than short-term memory."
b. "Memory changes are often worse when an individual is in an unfamiliar or stress-ful situation."
c. "Perhaps you are just noticing your fa-ther's memory loss now that he is hospi-talized."
d. "There is a lot of new information for your father to process here in the hospital; he is overloaded."
ANS: B
Memory changes are often worse when the individual is in unfamiliar or stressful situations, such as a hospitalization. Option A is not true, short-term memory is impacted more than long-term memory. Options C and D are true; however, they do not address the issue that the patient's daughter is discussing.
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