TITLE:
Research on the Mechanism of Radiation-Related Cognitive Impairment—A Review
AUTHORS:
He Zuo, Huaidong Cheng
KEYWORDS:
Radiation, Cognitive Impairment, Cerebral
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Cancer Therapy,
Vol.10 No.2,
February
22,
2019
ABSTRACT: Radiotherapy (RT) remains a kind of front-line treatment for the control
of tumor growth, especially for brain cancer. It is well known that cognitive impairment
is mainly caused by cerebral RT, but the mechanisms underlying
radiation-induced cognitive impairment remain unclear. There are different
views on the cognitive dysfunction caused by RT in different studies. The recently
research evidences about this topic are reviewed in present work. We found a
few of factors including brain injury directly caused by radiation, cerebral
tissue ischemia and necrosis caused by cerebrovascular injury, oxidative stress
and brain injury mediated by inflammation, etc. which play a crucial role in
the cognitive dysfunction caused by radiotherapy. These have all been widely
recognized, and recently evidences have also shown that potential therapeutic interventions
can effectively prevent cognitive impairment.