Cognitive Function in Breast Cancer Survivors Compared to Healthy Age- and Education-Matched Women

Abstract

The cognitive function of breast cancer survivors (BC, n = 52) and individually matched healthy controls (n = 52) was compared on a battery of sensitive neuropsychological tests. The BC group endorsed significantly higher levels of subjective memory loss and scored significantly worse than controls on learning and delayed recall indices from the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test (AVLT). Defining clinically significant impairment as scores at or below the 7th percentile of the control group, the rate of cognitive impairment in the BC sample was 17% for total learning on the AVLT, 17% for delayed recall on the AVLT, and 25% for either measure. Findings indicate that a sizeable percentage of breast cancer survivors have clinically significant cognitive impairment.

Keywords:

• Breast cancer
• Neuropsychological test
• Memory
• Cognition
• Mild cognitive impairment

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by grants from the American Cancer Society (RSGPB-04-089-01-PBP), the Mary Margaret Walther Program of the Walther Cancer Institute (100-200-20572), the National Institute on Aging (P30 AG10133), and National Institute of Nursing Research training fellowship to Dr Von Ah (T32 NR007066). We gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Ms. Anne Murphy-Knudsen and Ms. Sara Hickey.