Patients who were given general anesthesia before surgery performed slightly worse on memory tests, this was due to cognitive changes in the brain related to immediate memory, or the ability to remember information over a brief period. 'The cognitive changes after surgery are small-probably asymptomatic and beneath a person's awareness,' said senior author Dr Kirk Hogan, a professor of anesthesiology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
For the study, Dr Hogan and his colleagues measured memory and executive function in 964 participants, with the average age of 54, who had no signs of Alzheimer's disease, dementia, or cognitive impairment before surgery. Of the participants, 312 of them had at least one surgical procedure performed and 652 of them did not. Researchers found there was a decline in immediate memory over the course of four years in participants who had surgery.
Memory became abnormal in 18 percent of those who had at least one surgical procedure compared with 10 percent of those who had not. Regarding the working memory test, surgery and anesthesia were associated with a decline in immediate memory by one point out of a possible maximum test score of 30 points. They found no differences in other measures of memory and executive function between those who had surgery and their counterparts.
Patients having surgery and anesthesia are likely to experience impaired performance on neuropsychological tests of memory and executive function, an association that might be causal. Researchers found the activity of memory loss receptors remains high long after the drugs have been eliminated from the patient's body. Other risk factors like the sort of disease or illness a person have could impact brain function. Diseases like hypertension and diabetes may also be responsible for cognitive decline in patients who have had surgery.
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