Combined Approaches to the Skull Base for Intracranial Extension of Tumors via Perineural Spread Can Improve Patient Outcomes

Perineural tumor spread is the presence of tumor cells in the epineurium, perineurium, and/or endoneurium of a nerve, or involving at least one-third of the circumference around a nerve [1]. Spread typically occurs centripetally towards the skull base and central nervous system and occurs in less than 5% of head and neck carcinoma [2,3]. The most common malignancies with perineural spread include adenocystic carcinoma, in which up to 50% of cases have some degree of perineural involvement, mucosal squamous cell carcinomas, including nasopharyngeal carcinoma, and cutaneous neoplasms, such as melanoma and squamous cell carcinoma, the latter of which has an overall 3 –14% incidence of intracranial perineural extension [2–4].

Source: Clinical Neurology and Neurosurgery - August 28, 2016 Category: Neurosurgery Authors: Sheri K. Palejwala, Jonnae Y. Barry, Crystal N. Rodriguez, Chandni A. Parikh, Stephen A. Goldstein, G. Michael Lemole Source Type: research