Aggressive surgical management is most likely to improve outcomes in the treatment of children with meningiomas whereas upfront radiotherapy provides no benefit, a large analysis by Australian authors concludes.
In contrast to current adult recommendations the large meta-analysis of nearly 600 patients from 35 case series over the past two decades found that children and adolescents with meningiomas who underwent initial gross-total resection had significantly better RFS and overall survival than those with an initial subtotal resection.
Furthermore, and again in contrast to current adult guidelines, upfront radiotherapy offered no significant benefit for children in either RFS or overall survival.
The study authors from Western Australia said this finding was ‘surprising’, particularly since the treatment improved survival in adults.
A possible explanation was...
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