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Updated: Apr 3, 2026
Quantifying Cognitive Decrements Caused by Cranial Radiotherapy
Published on: October 18, 2011
Cognitive outcome after radiotherapy in brain tumor
Thomas Durand1, Marie-Odile Bernier, Isabelle Léger
1aUMR 8257 Cognition And Action Group, Université Paris Descartes, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Service de Santé des Armée, Paris bInstitut de Radioprotection et de Sureté nucléaire, Fontenay-Aux-Roses cInstitut Gustave Roussy, Villejuif dHôpital d'instruction des armées du Val-De-Grâce, Service de Neurologie, Paris eCentre de Lutte contre le Cancer Paul-Strauss, Strasbourg fHôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, Service de Neuro-Oncologie Mazarin, Paris, France.
Purpose Of Review:
Survival of brain tumor patients has increased with improvements in cancer treatments. However, treatments like radiotherapy can be neurotoxic and thus new end-points in clinical trials, as well as in individual management, have appeared. This article reviews the cognitive outcomes after radiotherapy in brain tumor patients, focusing on radiation-induced impairments, and then discusses actual cognitive assessment limitations.
Recent Findings:
Although physiopathology of radiation-induced cognitive impairments remains elusive, a general course can be described as acute, early-delayed, and late-delayed effects corresponding to different processes. The last is of high interest because the related impairments are irreversible. In this context, a cognitive assessment should be performed as often as possible, but actual tools are unfortunately not developed. Nevertheless, with respect to neuro-oncologic specificities, new cognitive tools could be developed to overcome these limitations.
Summary:
Improvements in neuropsychologic assessment for brain tumor patients are urgently needed. A dynamic vision of radiation-induced cognitive impairments appears inevitable and should lead to a change in actual considerations about neurotoxicity follow-up.
