Is asthma associated with cognitive impairments? A meta-analytic review

ABSTRACTIntroduction: Asthma is a chronic disease with significant health burden and socioeconomic and racial/ethnic disparities related to diagnosis and treatment. Asthma primarily affects the lungs, but can impact brain function through direct and indirect mechanisms. Some studies have suggested that asthma negatively impacts cognition, while others have failed to identify asthma-related cognitive compromise. We aimed to conduct a meta-analysis of cognition in individuals with asthma compared to that in healthy controls. We also examined the impact of some key potential moderators. Method: Data on cognitive outcome measures and sociodemographic, illness-related, and study-related variables were extracted from studies reporting cognitive test performance in individuals with asthma compared to that in controls. Results: There was no evidence of publication bias. A random-effects model examining differences in task performance between 2017 individuals with asthma and 2131 healthy controls showed significan...