Cancer treatment and cognitive function: chemotherapy is not the only culprit.

With the growing number of cancer survivors,[1] there is increased interest in understanding and preventing post-treatment sequelae that may limit full recovery to prediagnosis health. As a result, during the past 2 decades there has been growing interest in the evaluation of patient-reported complaints of persistent post-chemotherapy cognitive changes. Cognitive complaints often co-occur with fatigue and depressive symptoms in cancer patients, making it difficult for clinicians to evaluate whether these difficulties are merely associated with other physical and psychological etiologies, or are separate and distinct—direct side effects of cancer treatment.