P03.02 Incidence of neuropsychological disturbances in low-grade gliomas.

Abstract

BACKGROUND: In addition to seizures, patients with low grade-gliomas (LGG) may, to a lesser extent, present with headaches, focal neurologic signs and cognitive impairment. However if patients do not experience seizures and obvious neurological deficits, they are often considered asymptomatic and neuropsychological disturbances may go unnoticed. OBJECTIVE(S): Our aim was to describe the cognitive profile of patients suffering from LGG, giving a quantitative and qualitative characterization of the disorders. METHOD(S): A retrospective analysis was performed, collecting data by the neuropsychological assessments of patients newly diagnosed with LGG, admitted to our center from 2009 to 2015. We also obtained data on tumor location and surgery/biopsy. Neuropsychological evaluation was performed by means of standardized tests assessing different cognitive functions; in all cases the assessment occurred after surgery/biopsy. RESULT(S): Our study focused on 60 LGG patients (35M/25F, mean age 45.7 +/- 14.2 years). 46 patients (77%) underwent surgical resection; the remaining 14 (23%) biopsy. Tumor location was frontal (23, 38.3%), temporal (14, 23.3%), parietal (9, 15%), multiple (13, 21.7%) lobes; in one patient (1.7%) glioma involved the trunk. Little more than a half of patients (31, 51.7%) were cognitively undamaged; the other patients showed neuropsychological disturbances involving respectively: executive functions (4, 6.7%), memory (7, 11.7%), language (3, 5%), attention (2, 3%), visuo-spatial functions (2, 3%), multiple functions (11, 18.3%). CONCLUSION(S): Nearly half of LGG patients have neuropsychological impairments that, even mild, may negatively affect health-related quality of life, professional reintegration, interpersonal relationships, and leisure activities. Also considering that these patients often have a life expectance of years, greater attention should be paid to objective neuropsychological assessment to select the best individualized therapeutic management with preservation of quality of life.