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Pituitary adenoma with gangliocytic component: report of 5 cases with focus on immunoprofile of gangliocytic component

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Abstract

Introduction

Pituitary adenomas with gangliocytic component are rare tumors of the sellar region that are composed of pituitary adenoma cells and a ganglion cell component. Their histogenesis and hence nosology is not yet resolved because of the small number of cases reported and lack of large series in the literature.

Methods

Herein we report five cases of pituitary adenoma with gangliocytic component to add knowledge to this rare neoplasm.

Results

Three cases are functional mammosomatotroph adenomas, one case is functional sparsely granulated somatotroph adenoma and the other is functional corticotroph adenoma. Gangliocytic component showed immunohistochemical expression of hormones in three cases. The ganglion cells were prolactin immunoreactive in case 1, GH and TSH immunoreactive in case 5 and showed expression of prolactin, TSH, ACTH and FSH in case 4. Three cases had undergone more than one surgery of which two had gangliocytic cells only in the recurrent tumors whereas the third case showed gangliocytic cells only in the initial tumor.

Discussion

The cases are discussed with clinical and histological features and a brief review of the literature considering the histogenesis is included.

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Acknowledgments

Some of these cases were presented in the 13th Meeting of the European Neuroendocrine Association (17–20 October 2008 Antalya/Turkey) and the 18th National Pathology Congress of the Turkish Pathology Association (25–29 October 2008 Antalya/Turkey) as posters.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Patoloji Anabilim Dalı, Hacettepe Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Morfoloji Binası 5.Kat. Sıhhiye, 06100, Ankara, Turkey

    Serdar Balci, Arzu Saglam & Figen Soylemezoglu

  2. Department of Neurosurgery, Hacettepe University Faculty of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey

    Hakan Oruckaptan

  3. Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Hacettepe University Faculty of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey

    Tomris Erbas

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  1. Serdar Balci
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Correspondence to Figen Soylemezoglu.

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Balci, S., Saglam, A., Oruckaptan, H. et al. Pituitary adenoma with gangliocytic component: report of 5 cases with focus on immunoprofile of gangliocytic component. Pituitary 18, 23–30 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11102-013-0551-8

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