Neurobehavioral status and health-related quality of life in newly diagnosed high-grade glioma patients

Purpose: To evaluate the health-related quality of life (HRQOL) and cogniti ve functioning of high-grade glioma patients in the postneurosurgical perio d. Patients and Methods: The HRQOL, as assessed by the Short-Form Health Surve y-36, tumor-specific symptoms, and objective and subjective neuropsychologi c functioning, of 68 newly diagnosed glioma patients were compared with tha t of 50 patients with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and to age- and se x-matched healthy controls. The association between tumor lateralization, e xtent of resection, and use of medication, and the HRQOL outcomes was also investigated. Results: The HRQOL of the two patient groups was similar but significantly lower than that of the healthy controls. Glioma patients reported significa ntly more neurologic symptoms and poorer objective and subjective neuropsyc hologic functioning than the NSCLC patients. Using healthy controls as the reference group, cognitive impairment assessed at the individual patient le vel was observed in all glioma patients and 52% of the NSCLC patients. Poor performance on timed tasks in the glioma group could be attributed, in lar ge part, to visual and motor deficits. Tumor lateralization was found to af fect neuropsychologic functioning in a predictable manner. The extent of re section was not related significantly to neuropsychologic functioning. Cort icosteroid use was associated with better recognition memory, whereas antie pileptic drug use was correlated negatively with working memory capacity. Conclusion: The general HRQOL of glioma patients is similar to that of pati ents with NSCLC. However, they suffer from a number of condition-specific n eurologic and neuropsychologic problems that have a significant impact on t heir daily lives in the postsurgical period, before treatment with radiothe rapy.