Postoperative improvement in visual function in patients with tuberculum sellae meningiomas: results of the extended transsphenoidal and transcranial approaches.

Object: Recently, extended transsphenoidal surgery (ETSS) has become an alternative to transcranial surgery (TCS) for suprasellar meningiomas, although the relative benefits of ETSS have yet to be established. To evaluate the effectiveness of ETSS, the authors analyzed surgical outcomes of TCS and ETSS.

Methods: During a 12-year period, 28 patients with meningiomas arising from the tuberculum sellae underwent tumor removal at Kinki University Hospital. The first 12 patients underwent TCS, and the remaining 16 underwent ETSS. In the TCS group, the optic canal on the approach side was unroofed in all cases. In the ETSS group bilateral optic canals were opened, and the dural and bone defects of the skull base were repaired using abdominal fascia and hydroxyapatite cement. In half of the cases, lumbar drainage of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was also performed.

Results: In a retrospective analysis of this consecutive series of patients, improvement in visual acuity and intraoperative blood loss were significantly better in the ETSS group (p = 0.010 and p = 0.011, respectively), whereas improvement in visual field defects, operative times, and the tumor removal rate were not significantly different between the two groups. Nonvisual surgical complications such as CSF leakage (one patient) and infarction of a perforating artery (three patients) were observed in the TCS group. In the ETSS group, CSF leakage (two patients), anosmia (two patients), and infarction of a perforating artery (two patients) were observed.

Conclusions: Given the encouraging results in improvement in visual acuity, ETSS may be acceptable for the treatment of tuberculum sellae meningiomas.