Subjective Cognitive Complaints and Anecdotal Descriptions of Postoperative Cognitive Decline: Missing Pieces of the Postoperative Neurocognitive Disorder Puzzle.

Postoperative cognitive recovery is deeply important to patients and perioperative clinicians. Despite decades of data on "postoperative cognitive decline" (POCD), a research diagnosis based on objective cognitive test performance, perspectives on subjective cognitive complaints (SCC) after modern surgery/anesthesia have not been systematically collected or studied despite their recent inclusion in the 2018 redefinition of "postoperative neurocognitive disorder." The authors describe the alignment between SCC anecdotes and the research diagnosis of POCD, contextualizing these findings using recent literature within and outside anesthesiology. This article prepares anesthesiologists to discuss what is, and is not, known about subjective cognitive recovery after surgery/anesthesia.
Competing Interests: Disclosure Ms L.Y. Li has no disclosures to report. Dr A.M. Staffaroni reports receiving research support from the National Institute on Aging, United States (NIA) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Bluefield Project to Cure FTD, the Alzheimer's Association, United States the Larry L. Hillblom Foundation, United States the Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration, United States the ALS Association, United States and the Rainwater Charitable Foundation, United States; and consulting for Alector Inc, Eli Lilly and Company/Prevail Therapeutics, Passage Bio Inc, and Takeda Pharmaceutical Company; and receiving licensing fees as a coinventor of smartphone cognitive tests. Dr E.L. Whitlock reports receiving research support from the NIA of the NIH.
(Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)