Differential diagnosis of chiasmal-cellular cyst

Abstract

The clinical symptoms of chiasmal-cellular formations are similar, which significantly complicates its differential diagnostics. The differential diagnostics of chiasmal-cellular cysts, which include colloid cysts, arachnoid cysts, Rathke’s pouch cysts, epidermoid and dermoid cysts, is especially difficult. Nevertheless, an accurate preoperative differential diagnostics of chiasmal-cellular cysts is an important stage of preparation for surgical treatment, which allows determining the surgical tactics in advance, because each group of chiasmal-cellular cysts has its own features of surgical treatment, which significantly reduce the number of complications and minimize the number of recurrences. This study intended to improve the efficiency of diagnostics of the chiasmal-cellular cysts by determining the criteria for its differential diagnostics. 94 patients with chiasmal-cellular cysts and pituitary adenomas were examined and treated in the period of 2009 and 2018 for this purpose. As the most frequent pathology of the chiasmal-cellular area, pituitary adenomas were selected as a comparison group due to the fact that it is often necessary to differentiate chiasmal-cellular cysts with this pathology. Patients were divided into 5 groups according to the nosology of the disease. Clinical picture, laboratory analysis and MRI data were studied in each group. Statistical analysis and comparison of the data obtained among all groups were performed, and it allowed to determine the distinctive diagnostic features incidental to each group. It is possible to make an accurate preoperative diagnosis based on the specific features of differential diagnostics.