Performance on long delays of delayed response tasks is associated
with medial temporal function, a region of the brain affected
by severe hypoglycemia. A previous study showed that children
with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) with higher risk for severe
hypoglycemia performed worse than controls on long delays of
a spatial delayed response (SDR) task. We tested the more specific
hypothesis that frequency of severe hypoglycemia would relate
to long delay SDR performance. Children with T1DM (n
= 51) and controls (n = 32) performed the SDR task
with short and long delays. Information was collected on
children's past severe hypoglycemia. In children with T1DM,
number of past severe hypoglycemic episodes accounted for a
significant portion of the variance in long delay SDR after
controlling for age and age of onset. This relationship was
not seen with short delay SDR or with other tasks (verbal or
object memory, attention, motor speed). These results support
the hypothesis that severe hypoglycemia has specific, negative
effects on memory skills in children. If this relationship is
extrapolated to children with higher frequency of severe
hypoglycemia, due to longer duration of disease or poorer glucose
control, it may affect daily functioning and thus need to be
considered in treatment decisions. (JINS, 2003,
9, 740–750.)