Is Chemobrain Real?
A familiar name on the tip of your tongue, keys misplaced, a train of thought derailed in the middle of a sentence. If what I’ve just described sounds familiar, you may be experiencing symptoms of “chemobrain” – a name for the cognitive (how you process and recall information) difficulties associated with cancer treatment.
Although one of the most frustrating side effects of chemotherapy, not long ago, the medical profession was skeptical when patients who had completed treatment complained of a kind of mental haze or fog. Today, despite some lingering skepticism, research studies confirm what patients have long reported – that chemobrain is a real issue for people living with and beyond cancer.
The first of these studies which were published in 2011 was conducted at Stanford University and used functional MRI imaging (fMRI) to compare the brain images of healthy women and women with breast cancer. The study found that not only did brain activity differ, but that those patients who had undergone chemotherapy had additional specific differences and decreases in executive function – the mental processes that enable us to plan, focus attention, remember instructions, and juggle multiple tasks successfully.
