Cognitive function and breast cancer molecular subtype before and after chemotherapy

Chemotherapy-related cognitive impairment has been reported in patients with breast cancer and received growing attention due to increased survival rate. However, cognitive outcome according to pathological tumor features, especially human epidermal growth factor receptor (HER2) status, has not been clearly elucidated. Despite its potential link with cognitive status through neuroinflammatory response, existing research is sparse and limited to cross-sectional studies. In this observational cohort study, 52 breast cancer patients received a series of neuropsychological examinations before and after chemotherapy. Patients' performances were compared with normative data, and analyzed with Reliable Change Indices and mixed-model analysis of covariance. Results showed that there was a higher percentage of HER2(+) patients than HER2(-) patients who showed defective attention and processing speed before chemotherapy, and that there were more patients with HER2(+) status showing cognitive decline on tests of attention and executive functions following chemotherapy. Group-wise analyses confirmed the foregoing pattern and further revealed that patients with HER2(+) status also tended to deteriorate more in verbal memory after chemotherapy. These findings indicate that HER2 overexpression may serve as prognostic factors that help explain the heterogeneous cognitive outcome in breast cancer survivors. Further studies are needed to replicate this finding and delineate the underlying mechanisms.