© 2008 Psychology Press, an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa business http://www.psypress.com/jcen DOI: 10.1080/13803390802064599 JOURNAL OF CLINICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL NEUROPSYCHOLOGY 2009, 31 (1), 140–144 NCEN Neuropsychological functioning following craniopharyngioma removal Outcome Following Craniopharyngioma Removal Harry N. Bawden, 1,2 Sonia Salisbury, 2 Gail Eskes, 3 and Rachel Morehouse 4 1 Department of Psychology, IWK Health Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada 2 Department of Pediatrics, IWK Health Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada and Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada 3 Department of Psychology, Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada 4 Department of Psychiatry, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada The neuropsychological functioning of patients who had undergone surgical removal of craniopharyngiomas was compared to that of an endocrine control group composed of patients with nontumor hypopituitarism, an obese control group, and a normal control group. Neuropsychological assessments consisting of measures of intelligence, memory, attention, and executive functioning were carried out. The craniopharyngioma group had lower Performance IQ than did the normal control group, but their Performance IQ was comparable to that of the hypopituitarism and obese control groups. The craniopharyngioma patients did not differ in Verbal or Full Scale IQs from the remaining groups. There were no group differences on measures of verbal or nonverbal memory, ability to sustain attention, or executive functioning including measures of verbal or figural fluency, nonverbal problem solving, ability to copy a complex geometric figure, and visual motor and visual sequencing skills. The group mean scores on the measures of intelligence and neuropsychological abilities for the craniopharyngioma patients were in the low-average to average range. While craniopharyngioma patients can have significant morbidity including endocrine and visual deficits as well as obesity resulting from hyperphagia, neuropsychological deficits are not always present. Their neuropsychological outcome is more benign than some previous studies have suggested. Keywords: Craniopharyngioma; Outcome; Neuropsychology; Executive functioning; Intelligence. Craniopharyngiomas account for approximately 1 to 4% of intracranial tumors and about 6 to 9% of childhood brain tumors. Although they are benign, their location near the hypothalamus, optic tracts, and pituitary stalk and their tendency to adhere to and infiltrate surrounding tissue sometimes make them difficult to completely remove, without sacrificing adjunct brain struc- tures (Hoffman, 1994; Sanford & Muhlbauer, 1991). An attempt at total resection, sometimes followed by additional surgery or radiotherapy following tumor recurrence, appears to be the most prevalent treatment approach. There have been several studies that have exam- ined tumor recurrence, morbidity, and mortality following surgical treatment of craniopharyngiomas (e.g., Duff et al., 2000; van Effenterre & Boch, 2002). Well-recognized sequelae of the disruptive presence of the tumor and treatment for crani- opharyngioma include endocrine deficits (Curtis, Daneman, Hoffman, & Ehrlich, 1994; DeVile, Grant, Hayward, & Stanhope, 1996), due to hypothalamic/ Portions of this paper were presented at the International Neuropsychological Society meeting, Chicago, February, 2001. This work was funded by a grant from the IWK Health Centre. The authors would like to thank the participants, N. Ciccarelli and G. Dragone, for completing the assessments, C.A. Armour for organizing the project and scheduling participants, and D. Carr for manuscript preparation. Address correspondence to Harry N. Bawden, IWK Health Centre, 5850/5980 University Avenue, PO Box 9700, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3K 6R8 (E-mail: harry.bawden@iwk.nshealth.ca).