A Case Control Study to Evaluate the Cognitive and Brain Function of β-thalassemia Patients.

β-thalassemia syndromes are a group of hereditary disorders characterized by a genetic deficiency in the synthesis of beta-globin chains. In recent studies done in β-thalassemia major patients abnormal iron deposition was evident using MRI in brain structures, cortex, putamen, and caudate nucleus . In most of the cases the neurological involvement is subclinical. Cognitive functioning was evaluated in beta thalassemia major, compared with healthy controls, using a neuropsychological battery including tests of abstract reasoning, attention, executive functions, language, constructional/visuospatial skills, and memory. Patients with beta thalassemia major, in particular those showing signs of hemosiderosis, had significantly impaired function in all neuropsychological tests. There was no relationship between cognitive performances and signs of deferoxamine toxicity, deferoxamine dosage, and levels of hemoglobin and ferritin. Event-related potentials (ERPs) are one of the most informative and dynamic methods of monitoring the information stream in the living brain. ERPs are linked in time with a physical or mental event, and are typically extracted from the scalp-recorded electroencephalogram (EEG) by means of signal averaging. ERPs have been used in the assessment of cognitive function in several disorders, including anemia and iron deficiency anemia. However, literature regarding cognitive function and ERP activity in thalassemia patients is extremely limited, especially in adults. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the cognitive and brain function in a group of 60 thalassemia patients and compare the results to healthy controls.