Craniofacial resection for malignant tumours involving the anterior skull base

Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol. 2006 Jul;263(7):647-52. doi: 10.1007/s00405-006-0032-z. Epub 2006 Mar 15.

Abstract

Ethmoid malignant tumours are rare, but nearly all at least approach or involve the lamina cribrosa. An anterior craniofacial resection is almost always mandatory for a radical resection. While almost everything has been written about technical details, few studies reported meaningful analysis about prognostic factors and long-term results, for a series of reasons: the infrequency of these tumours, the variety of histologies, small patients cohorts presented by each author, a medley of untreated and pre-treated patients, the lack of a universally accepted classification. We perform a review of the literature in the light of our experience of 330 anterior craniofacial resections for ethmoid malignant tumours. We present our classification of ethmoid malignant tumours (called INT, Istituto Nazionale Tumori). It turned out to be more prognostic than AJCC-UICC classification.

Publication types

  • Review

MeSH terms

  • Adenocarcinoma / classification
  • Adenocarcinoma / surgery
  • Carcinoma / classification
  • Carcinoma / surgery*
  • Carcinoma, Adenoid Cystic / classification
  • Carcinoma, Adenoid Cystic / surgery
  • Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / classification
  • Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / surgery
  • Cranial Fossa, Anterior / surgery*
  • Ethmoid Sinus
  • Humans
  • Paranasal Sinus Neoplasms / classification
  • Paranasal Sinus Neoplasms / surgery*
  • Prognosis
  • Skull Base / surgery
  • Skull Base Neoplasms / classification
  • Skull Base Neoplasms / surgery*
  • Treatment Outcome