Neurosurgery
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Meta Analysis
Quality of Life After Epilepsy Surgery in Children: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.
Pediatric epilepsy surgery is a treatment modality appropriate for select patients with debilitating medication-resistant seizures. Previous publications have studied seizure freedom as the main outcome of epilepsy surgery. However, there has been no systematic assessment of the postoperative life quality for these children. ⋯ Epilepsy surgery can effectively improve QOL in children with medication-resistant seizures, through seizure freedom, which was associated with the greatest improvement in life quality.
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Review
Strategies to Mitigate Toxicities From Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy for Spine Metastases.
Improvements in systemic therapy are translating into more patients living longer with metastatic disease. Bone is the most common site of metastasis, where spinal lesions can result in significant pain impacting quality of life and possible neurological dysfunction resulting in a decline in performance status. ⋯ In our review, we provide an in-depth review and expert commentary regarding seminal literature that defined clinically meaningful toxicity endpoints with actionable dosimetric limits and/or clinical management strategies to mitigate toxicity potentially attributable to SBRT of the spine. We placed a spotlight on radiation myelopathy (de novo, reirradiation after conventional external beam radiation therapy or salvage after an initial course of spinal SBRT), plexopathy, vertebral compression fracture, pain flare, esophageal toxicity, myositis, and safety regarding combination with concurrent targeted or immune therapies.
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Synovial Sarcoma of the Nerve-Clinical and Pathological Features: Case Series and Systematic Review.
Synovial sarcoma of the nerve is a rare entity with several cases and case series reported in the literature. Despite an improved understanding of the biology, the clinical course is difficult to predict. ⋯ By combining cases from our institution with historical data and performing statistical analysis we show correlation between tumor size and death.