Surgical Management of Pituitary Tumors

Kang, Joon Ki

Abstract

Over the past 10 years, considerable advances have been made in the surgical treatment of pituitary adenomas, with a high incidence of complete tumor removal reported. Increasing use of surgical magnification for surgery of the sellar region has created a need for more detailed surgical anatomical studies of this area and for special attention to the anatomical variants important to the transfrontal and transsphenoidal surgical approaches. The author discussed the surgical problems conderning hypersecretory pituitary adenomas. Here, there is a triple objective:treatment of the tumor, treatment of the hyperhormonism and the prevention of postoperative recurrences and complications. In this paper, an attempt has been made to correlate a surgical management of pituitary tumor characteristics with 1) microsurgical anatomy of the sella region; 2) surgical approaches and indication; 3) surgical complications; 4) comparison of therapentic options between surgical and medical treatment; 5) pituitary adenoma and pregnancy; 6) management of recurrent hyperfunctional pituitary adenomas; 7) pre-and postoperative radiation therapeutic effects.