Does chemo destroy Brain cells?

Hi Sherry,

I would swear it does. My doctors, however, have told me that lack of estrogen and menopause in general can cause similar symptoms. I am tempted to blame it on chemo. It's funny you mentioned handwriting. At back to school night, my son's teacher asked parents to write something they should know about our child but maybe the child would be too embarrassed to let her know himself. So I was writing about my son's handwriting issues--he used to have an occupational therapist, he has a hand tremor that makes writing tiresome--anyhow, as I'm writing and seeing my horrible scribble and actually having trouble forming letters, I thought when did MY handwriting get so bad. It was ironic and embarrassing for me.

I don't know what the solution is but wanted you to know, you're in good (but frustrated) company!

Does anyone have hearing problems since chemo?  I am now almost deaf, something that was never a problem before.  I am wondering if this is temporary like vision?

the latest research  using MRI and fMRI does confirm that the brain changes from chemo.  In particular they noted changes in the size of the frontal lobe and some other areas.  It changes memory and  processing speed.  the good news is that the brain is slightly more "plastic" than we thought and the neurons do learn to use adjoining cell areas of the brain in compensation.  So, for some, there will be no long lasting effect and for others there will be some. 

 CHEMOBRAIN IS REAL!

The latest theory is that chemo brain is real and that for some it is permanent. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/04/health/04brod.html?_r=1&ref=health  (that is an attempt to post a link to an August 4, 2009 article in the New York Times by Jane Brody).  

 I fear that I may be one of those----a few months into chemo i would feel as if there was a space in my head and I just could not process the information that I needed to speak or think.  I finished chemo in May and I still have this feeling from time to time---my mind is not exactly the same as before.  However it has improved from when I was actually on chemo.  Hopefully,  it will continue to improve.

Chemo is so bad.  I know I should be thankful it is saving my life.  But the SEs are so bad.  I pray to God that all of my SEs are not perm.  I hope none of them stay with me but the chances of that I think are slim.

How about stuttering.  Not all the time.  I now stutter, has anyone had that?  Does that stay?  That was truly the most embarrassing at my 6 y/o daughters soccer game on Sat while I was cheering her on from the stands stuttering as I was yelling.

Sherry hope you dont mind me asking questions on your thread, but it seems like the right place. 

Hugs

Im definatly not the same up top since having chemo. My concentration is zero. My vocabulary is getting back though...it will be 2 years since finishing chemo in February for me and I still have side effects here and there.

+++++++++++

Well, my last chemo was 10/4/2006, and I still have major problems.  I would say that my memory issues and lack of ability to focus are my biggest concern at this time.  I also do medical transcription.  It takes me almost twice as long as it used to just to get through my work.  I am constantly looking things up that I "used" to know.  I have the same problems with the movies, except I don't remember watching them when my husband tells me we did.  I cannot remember what books I have read.  I lose track of time daily, weekly, monthly, yearly.  I am shocked that it is September (well, really October). 

My doctor does not think it was chemo (or so she says), my husband blames it on "our age"..51, my kids think it is because I don't pay attention, but I truly believe it was the chemo.  I was very organized, etc. before BC and now, I do not resemble that person at all.  I really feel good if I get something accomplished on any given day no matter how small it is because it meant that I had to focus and follow through on something.  I was put into menopause from chemo so maybe there is some truth to that, but wow, it was a dramatic and fast decline.

I wish someone had the answers.  It is very frustrating that my family/friends sometimes must think I am making excuses for my forgetfulness when I know that "something" just is not right.  My husband and doctor have both at one time implied that I gave myself amnesia somehow because I do not remember any day at all that I was given chemo once the needle went in.  I think it is because my doctor over-drugged me.  Doesn't Ativan (which I know was in that huge bag of pre-drugs) cause memory loss?  That is my answer as to why I cannot remember chemo days, but as to the rest of it, I just don't know.

Eighteen patients with advanced epithelial ovarian cancer were given 36 courses of cis-platinum-containing chemotherapy at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Patients were given lorazepam (Ativan) prior to chemotherapy. Amnesia for the day of chemotherapy was reported in 29 courses. Lack of recall for the chemotherapy infusion and the subsequent 8 hr or greater was reported in 33 of the 36 courses. In two courses, no amnesia effects were noted. No serious side effects of lorazepam therapy occurred and all patients believed that the amnesic effect was beneficial during chemotherapy. Lorazepam (Ativan) appears to be a safe medication to induce amnesia for cis-platinum chemotherapy and deserves further study to determine its effect on anticipatory vomiting, nausea and vomiting, and patient compliance with continued chemotherapy.

from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6538534

PMID: 6538534 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

I'm a hospital pharmacist, and at our hospital, they routinely give Ativan (or other benzodiazepines) before/during chemotherapy, not only to relieve anxiety but to help prevent nausea/vomiting.

They often also give corticosteroids, which can help with nausea, which can also affect memory.  This paper says that corticosteroids can have different effects on different individuals, and over time, but it sounds like they CAN affect memory. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18824040

There is an ongoing study via Army of Women about chemobrain.  I'm sure there are others also.  I do not doubt chemobrain is real.

Love the T-shirt, cherneski.

What's  Dr. Silverman's excuse??? 

"A professor at the University of Rochester Medical Center, Mark Noble, reports that cancer drugs proved to be more toxic to healthy cells than to malignant ones. Chemo drugs killed 40% to 80% of cancer cells and even 70% to 100% of healthy brain cells. ...

The head of UCLA's neuronuclear imaging section, dr. Silverman says that the previous reports do not prove that killing brain cells causes cognitive problems and that additional experiments should be conducted to see if the rats who lost brain cells had bigger problems than the others in solving intelligence tasks." 

What a maroon....

I first "noticed" loss of hearing when my son said "Mom! The crickets are singing" ( It was the first part of spring)  I could not hear the crickets.  I had had a hearing test about a year before chemo and all was normal.  I went for another hearing test and, yep, there was significant loss.  I am 5  years out from chemo now, and can again hear crickets, but there are somethings that haven't come back.  If you think about chemo and the loss of hair, all your hair, it includes those tiny little ones in our ears that we never think about.  Until you lose hearing of course.

Hi All,

I was just told yesterday by a friend that is a breast cancer survivor being treated at the Mayo Clinic in Fl, that there is a new study being conducted there to address the issues of chemo brain. She said that she didn't qualify to be in the study, so she didn't know the details.

It is irritating. My oncologist said that he had never heaard of chemotherapy causing chemo-brain and dismissed me completely.  i hate cancer docs and I hate cancer and most of all I hate chemo brain. I can no longer focus, concentrate, process math problems, remember important dates, balance my checkbook, etc. Prior to chemo, I had an excelllent memory, excellent math, calculuis, and physics skills, and beautiful handwriting. Forget all of that now. 

C

Hi Mandy!

It seems that my oncologists live in a world of denial. It took months for them to admit that I had neuropathy - "because it was supposed to "go away"".  I do hate them! At least after I confronted my surgeons, they became more attentive and stopped treating me as though I was the most ignorant person in the county. 

C

I am having problems, still, five years out from diagnosis. A couple recent examples--I found a note I had written to myself. I have been writing a lot more notes and lists as a way to cope with my memory problems. It said, "Return special keys". I have no idea what that means. Now that's just not normal. Also a couple days ago I put a frozen meal in the microwave. I went to change laundry downstairs while it cooked. I came back up, cooked myself a nice pasta dinner, did dishes, went to bed. The next morning I opened my microwave and there was the frozen meal. I used to have the proverbial steel trap of a mind and it is very disappointing to me that I do these things. I feel in my bones that it is chemobrain.

A friend gave me a book called "Your Brain After Chemo" by Silverman and Davidson. It was very readable, informative, and hopeful. I recommend it.  

Thanks for the booik suggestion kareylou. I just ordered it.