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Adaptation of visual cortex to damage of visual pathways in suprasellar tumors before and after gamma knife radiosurgery

  • Clinical Study
  • Published:
Journal of Neuro-Oncology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

To demonstrate that lesions of the visual pathways due to suprasellar tumors are accompanied by alterations of the visual cortex and to see if these alterations are reversible after treatment of tumors by gamma knife radiosurgery.

Materials and methods

In 36 patients with peri-optic tumors and defects of their visual fields and in an age-matched control group, magnetic resonance imaging was performed before and after treatment. T1 weighted images were evaluated by voxel-based morphometry and correlated to the degree of visual field defects.

Results

In patients, grey matter density and cortical thickness were reduced in all parts of the occipital cortex, reaching significance (p < 0.05) in the left superior and middle occipital gyri, with correlation to visual field defects. Follow-up scans showed further reduction in all occipital areas.

Conclusion

As in other peripheral lesions of the optic system, damage of the optic pathways affects the visual cortex. A prospective follow-up study is needed to determine if these alterations are reversible after successful tumor treatment.

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Abbreviations

CC:

Correlation coefficient

GKRS:

Gamma knife radiosurgery

DTI:

Diffusion tensor imaging

FA:

Fractional anisotropy

MD:

Mean diffusivity

AD:

Axial diffusivity

RD:

Radial diffusivity

HF-SRS:

Hypo-fractionated stereotactic radiosurgery

AVP:

Anterior visual pathway

SFED:

Single fraction equivalent dose

TIV:

Total intracranial volume

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro Gamma Knife Dominicano, CEDIMAT, Plaza de la Salud, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

    Herwin Speckter, José Bido, Giancarlo Hernandez, Diones Rivera, Luis Suazo, Santiago Valenzuela, Jairo Oviedo & Peter Stoeter

  2. Department of Radiology, CEDIMAT, Plaza de la Salud, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

    Herwin Speckter, Jairo Oviedo, Cesar F. Gonzalez, Bernd Foerster & Peter Stoeter

  3. Institute of Ocular Pathology, Torre MedicalNet, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

    Remberto Escoto

Authors
  1. Herwin Speckter
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  2. José Bido
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  3. Giancarlo Hernandez
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  4. Diones Rivera
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  5. Luis Suazo
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  6. Santiago Valenzuela
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  8. Jairo Oviedo
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  11. Peter Stoeter
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Contributions

Conception and design: Peter Stoeter, Herwin Speckter. Data collection: Jose Bido, Remberto Escoto, Cesar Gonzalez, Giancarlo Hernandez, Jairo Oviedo, Diones Rivera, Luis Suazo, Santiago Valenzuela, Peter Stoeter, Herwin Speckter. Data analysis and interpretation: Jose Bido, Remberto Escoto, Bernd Foerster, Cesar Gonzalez, Giancarlo Hernandez, Jairo Oviedo, Diones Rivera, Luis Suazo, Santiago Valenzuela, Herwin Speckter, Peter Stoeter. Manuscript writing: Peter Stoeter, Herwin Speckter, Remberto Escoto. Final approval of manuscript: Jose Bido, Remberto Escoto, Bernd Foerster, Giancarlo Hernandez, Jairo Oviedo, Diones Rivera, Luis Suazo, Santiago Valenzuela, Cesar Gonzalez, Peter Stoeter, Herwin Speckter.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Herwin Speckter.

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Conflict of interest

All authors declares that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. This study has been approved by the ethic committee of CEDIMAT (CEI-290).

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Research involving human participants and/or animals

This article does not contain any studies with animals performed by any of the authors.

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Speckter, H., Bido, J., Hernandez, G. et al. Adaptation of visual cortex to damage of visual pathways in suprasellar tumors before and after gamma knife radiosurgery. J Neurooncol 142, 275–282 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11060-019-03092-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11060-019-03092-4

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