{"doi":"10.1007/s00520-025-09212-3","title":"The effect of non-pharmacological interventions on cognitive function in cancer: an overview of systematic reviews","abstract":"PURPOSE: A significant number of cancer survivors experience cancer-related cognitive impairment (CRCI), which can impact their ability to think, reason, make decisions, and perform daily actions. In recent years, non-pharmacological interventions for CRCI have gained significant attention. These interventions include exercise, cognitive behavioural therapy, cognitive training/remediation, dietary, mind-body, and multi-modal/complex interventions. This umbrella review provides a critical overview to inform guidelines and current practice, identify the most promising interventions, and uncover gaps in the research literature. METHODS: This umbrella review of systematic reviews was pre-registered on Open Science Framework and PROSPERO. Six databases were searched. Systematic reviews (SR) assessing any non-pharmacological interventions to improve cognition in cancer (any type) were included. The overview followed gold-standard guidelines and recommendations. The results were narratively synthesised, and descriptive statistics and effect size ranges were calculated. RESULTS: Sixty-four (n = 64) SRs were included. Results were synthesised into four non-pharmacological domains. Cognitive training/rehabilitation had the strongest evidence for efficacy. Physical activity/exercise showed promising efficacy; however, the variability of findings was considerable. Mind-body and psychological/behavioural therapy interventions were limited, but there was evidence for short-term effectiveness. Multi-modal/complex interventions showed potential for improving cognition in cancer but were poorly defined. CONCLUSIONS: Overall, non-pharmacological interventions demonstrated efficacy for improving cognition in cancer. There were limited intervention characteristics within domains which were consistently related to efficacy. Three key recommendations are provided for future research: (1) adopt harmonisation and reporting guidelines; (2) develop definitional guidelines of cognitive domains for CRCI research; and (3) assess intervention and participant characteristics associated with positive versus null/negative findings.","journal":"Supportive Care in Cancer","year":2025,"id":515579,"datarank":0.40620753016533157,"base_score":2.70805020110221,"endowment":2.70805020110221,"self_citation_contribution":0.40620753016533157,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.40620753016533157,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":14,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9575,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2025-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":707451,"name":"Ashley M. Henneghan","orcid":"0000-0002-6733-1926","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":407805,"name":"Alexandre Chan","orcid":"0000-0003-4391-4219","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":407802,"name":"Raymond J. Chan","orcid":"0000-0003-0248-7046","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1379900,"name":"Haryana M. Dhillon","orcid":"0000-0003-4039-5169","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":107119,"name":"Maryam B. Lustberg","orcid":"0000-0001-8559-5645","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1038894,"name":"Janette L. Vardy","orcid":"0000-0002-5739-5790","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1223259,"name":"Moira O’Connor","orcid":null,"position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1380523,"name":"Norah Elvidge","orcid":null,"position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1222707,"name":"Evan Dauer","orcid":"0009-0002-9161-5467","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1240528,"name":"Oscar Y. Franco‐Rocha","orcid":"0000-0002-5547-1518","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1379901,"name":"Shradha Vasan","orcid":"0000-0002-6505-7337","position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1379902,"name":"James R. D. Murray","orcid":"0000-0003-4067-8046","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1379903,"name":"Megan Crichton","orcid":"0000-0002-1273-5368","position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1379904,"name":"Helen Wilding","orcid":"0000-0003-3894-1239","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":492475,"name":"Susan L. Rossell","orcid":"0000-0002-7415-8252","position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":782801,"name":"Nicolas H. Hart","orcid":"0000-0003-2794-0193","position":16,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1222706,"name":"Darren Haywood","orcid":"0000-0002-9317-4135","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":105,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:48:39.436300Z","pmid":"39904905","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}