Psychic changes in patients with brain tumor

Abstract

Aim: To analyze prevalence and type of psychic changes in primary and secondary brain tumors consideringage, gender, location of the tumor, neurologic status and treatment of patients.Patients and method: In this retrospective study medical records of 101 patients with brain tumor treatedat the Department of Neurology, Clinical Center University of Sarajevo in the period 2000 – 2005were analyzed: 58 males and 43 females with age mean of 62.60 ± 1.28 years; the number of patientsaccording to neoplasm origin was equal (51 primary and 50 secondary tumors).Results: Psychic changes appeared more often in patients with primary tumors (54.2%) as comparedto patients with metastases (45.8%), but the difference was not significant. Mental status changes werealmost equally distributed according to gender. Significantly more often disturbances occurred amongolder patients as compared to the younger and middle age patients (p=0.0074). The most frequent tumorlocation was in the right hemisphere in patients with altered mental state (40.7%). Leading mental statusabnormality in patients with primary tumors was bradyphrenia, and disorientation in patients withmetastases (p=0.0038).Conclusion: Psychic changes in cases of brain tumors are unspecific and mostly manifest in elderly patients.Detailed examination of the psychic status is indispensable for all the suspect cases to neoplasmin order for timely diagnosis of the disease.

Keywords

• psychic changes
• primary brain tumors
• metastases