The Executive Function In Patients With Frontal Lobe Tumor

Objective:(1)To study whether the executive function is impaired in patients with frontal lobe tumor and the features of the impairment.(2)Compare the differences of the impairments between the patients with left frontal lobe tumor and those with right frontal lobe tumor.(3)Discuss the different importance of left frontal lobe and right frontal lobe in the different part of executive function.Methods:Three groups include 27 patients with left frontal lobe tumor,27 patients with right frontal lobe tumor and 30 normal adults were measured by Wisconsin Card Sort ing Test(WCST),Working Memory Test Battery(WMTB),Trail Making Test(TMT)and Gong's Non-verbal intelligence Test.Compare the results of three grounps and study whether the defferences are significant.Results:(1)There are significant defferences between the left frontal lobe group(LF)and the right frontal lobe group(RF)and normal controls(NC)in three indicators including Auditory-speech working memory(ASWM),Stroops and Process speed(PS).The differences between RF and NC are also signicant.Meanwile,there is signicant difference in Visuospatial working memory(VSWM)between RF and LF,NC.(2)The differences of five indicators including categories achieved(CA),the number of trials to complete the first category(R1st), perserative responses(PR),percent of perserative errors(PE%)and the percent of the conceptual level responses(CLR%)are signicant between LF and RF,NC(p＜0.05),the same between RF and NC(p＜0.05).(3)The time of TMT-a,The time of TMT-b and errors of TMT-b are signicant between LF ande RF,NC.Meanwhile,the time there is no significant difference between RF and NC,but the time of TMT-b and error of TMT-b are also significant different between RF and NC.(4)After controlling the ASWM and VSWM,compare the results of WCSTand TMT.It shows that CA and PE%are not significant different between LF,RF and NC.CLR%and PR are significant different between LF and RF,but both groups are significant compared with NC.R1sts are significant between RF,LF and NC.Meanwhile,the difference of time of TMT-a is no signicant different between LF,RFand NC,the time of TMT-b has significant difference when LF is compared with RF and NC,but is not significant when RF is compared with NC.Conclusions:(1)The executive function is impaired by frontal lobe tumors.(2)The executive function in patients with left frontal lobe tumors is more impaired compared to that of those with right frontal lobe tumors,but the spatial working memory of patients with right frontal lobe tumors is more impaired.(3)Impairent of working memory maybe the most important cause of impairent of executive function.