What is a pituitary adenoma?
It is an almost always benign tumor that grows in the pituitary gland, located under the brain, at the base of the skull, and at the bottom of the nasal fossa. They are tumors, in general, of slow growth but frequent. Observation may be the best approach if small, asymptomatic growths stop spontaneously.
How is a pituitary adenoma diagnosed?
When a pituitary adenoma does not produce hormones, we call it non-functioning, and it will give symptoms only due to compression when it reaches a specific size. In these cases, they can cause headaches, vision alterations (typically affecting vision in the lateral fields), and failures in the normal hormonal function of the gland.
If the adenomas produce some hormone (functioning adenomas), the initial symptoms usually correspond to the excess of this hormone in the body and cause an endocrinological disease that is diagnosed for this reason.
Blood tests to measure these hormones and magnetic resonance imaging are the main tests to diagnose and guide the management of these tumors.
What is the treatment for a pituitary adenoma?
If the finding has been accidental (incidental), the lesion is not large, and does not cause any objective disorder, observation is the usual recommendation.
But if the lesion is bulky, causes symptoms, or shows growth in controls, treatment is usually advised. In this case, surgery is generally the first option. We only have a reasonably effective pharmacological treatment for prolactin-producing adenomas (prolactinomas). In these cases, medication can control the excess hormone well and reduce tumor size in 75-80% of cases. But surgical removal of the lesion is the best option in those that do not respond and in the rest of functioning and non-functioning tumors. If the tumor is not very large and widespread, this treatment can be curative. In cases where complete removal is not possible, radiotherapy treatments can stabilize the disease.
Due to the location of these tumors at the bottom of the nasal cavity, we can use this natural way to remove them. We use endoscopes and special instruments to operate through the nostrils in the least invasive way without leaving any trace of the visible intervention.
