Background
The compression of peritumoral healthy tissue in brain tumor patients is considered a major cause of life-threatening neurologic symptoms. This condition is associated with an increase in intracranial pressure. The literature reports that GBM has a mass effect in 72% of autoptic brains of patients who died of brain tumor, with herniation in 50% of all cases.
Material and methods
We present a preliminary clinical series on 5 cases. The patients are chosen based on criteria of recurrent glioblastoma without the possibility of a gross total resection with a recurrence after STUPP protocol. The surgeries include cytoreduction and augmentative craniotomy. The aim is to increase the intracranial volume and reduce the intracranial pressure in evolving glioblastoma. Clinical and radiological follow-up considers different objective scales and contrast enhancement MRI performed every 3 months. We evaluate KPS, survival rate, complication rate, quality of life using QOL-BN20 and neuropsychological assessment.
Results
The 12 months of follow-up shows a mean survival rate of 9 months after the surgery. This procedure has no negative impact on the survival rate, complication rate, and quality of life reduction. The neuropsychological evaluation does not show an impact on self-perception of aesthetic appearance. The surgery does not show surgical wound complications. The mean operative time was 225 minutes and was comparable with standard recurrence glioblastoma procedure.
Conclusion
This work has the main limitation of being preliminary results on small population. However, these results show encouraging outcomes and could be an innovative and salvage therapy for recurrent and incurable glioblastoma. Further follow-up and study must be performed.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.