Post-operative Cerebellar Mutism Syndrome: Rehabilitation Issues

Overview

Journal Childs Nerv Syst

Specialty Pediatrics

Date 2019 Jun 22

PMID 31222445

Citations 16

Authors

Philippe F Paquier

Karin S Walsh

Kimberley M Docking

Helen Hartley

Ram Kumar

Coriene E Catsman-Berrevoets

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Introduction: Tumors of the cerebellum are the most common brain tumors in children. Modern treatment and aggressive surgery have improved the overall survival. Consequently, growing numbers of survivors are at high risk for developing adverse and long-term neurological deficits including deficits of cognition, behavior, speech, and language. Post-operative cerebellar mutism syndrome (pCMS) is a well-known and frequently occurring complication of cerebellar tumor surgery in children. In the acute stage, children with pCMS may show deterioration of cerebellar motor function as well as pyramidal and cranial neuropathies. Most debilitating is the mutism or the severe reduction of speech and a range of neurobehavioral symptoms that may occur. In the long term, children that recover from pCMS continue to have more motor, behavioral, and cognitive problems than children who did not develop pCMS after cerebellar tumor surgery. The severity of these long-term sequelae seems to be related to the length of the mute phase.

Aim Of This Narrative Review: The impact of pCMS on patients and families cannot be overstated. This contribution aims to discuss the present knowledge on the natural course, recovery, and rehabilitation of children with pCMS. We suggest future priorities in developing rehabilitation programs in order to improve the long-term quality of life and participation of children after cerebellar tumor surgery and after pCMS in particular.

Citing Articles

Errors in the Spontaneous Language of Survivors of Pediatric Cerebellar Tumors.

Svaldi C, Galli J, Paquier P, Keulen S, Van Elp H, Catsman-Berrevoets C Cerebellum. 2025; 24(1):26.

PMID: 39762598 PMC: 11703980. DOI: 10.1007/s12311-024-01754-2.

Neuroanatomy of cerebellar mutism syndrome: the role of lesion location.

Skye J, Bruss J, Toescu S, Aquilina K, Grafft A, Bardi Lola G Brain Commun. 2024; 6(4):fcae197.

PMID: 39015767 PMC: 11250198. DOI: 10.1093/braincomms/fcae197.

REhabilitation Approaches in CHildren with cerebellar mutism syndrome (REACH): An international cross-disciplinary survey study.

Samargia-Grivette S, Hartley H, Walsh K, Lemiere J, Payne A, Litke E J Pediatr Rehabil Med. 2024; 17(2):185-197.

PMID: 38393929 PMC: 11307050. DOI: 10.3233/PRM-230006.

Characterising the Long-Term Language Impairments of Children Following Cerebellar Tumour Surgery by Extracting Psycholinguistic Properties from Spontaneous Language.

Svaldi C, Paquier P, Keulen S, Van Elp H, Catsman-Berrevoets C, Kingma A Cerebellum. 2023; 23(2):523-544.

PMID: 37184608 PMC: 10951034. DOI: 10.1007/s12311-023-01563-z.

Case Report: Zolpidem's paradoxical restorative action: A case report of functional brain imaging.

Boisgontier J, Beccaria K, Saitovitch A, Blauwblomme T, Guida L, Fillon L Front Neurosci. 2023; 17:1127542.

PMID: 37123350 PMC: 10140395. DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2023.1127542.

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