Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Prolactinomas, although considered benign, show various intensity of aggressiveness. Some remain constant for whole life period while some harbour initially with invasive extension to the parasellar area. We aimed to evaluate the effect of age and gender on the invasiveness of prolactinomas.

Material-methods: One hundred and thirteen patients with prolactinoma were retrospectively evaluated. Magnetic resonance images were carefully examined and patients were classified as having invasive or non-invasive adenomas. Presence of cavernous sinus invasion, suprasellar extension or dimensions larger than two centimeters at the initial presentation judged as an invasive adenoma. We compared age at the diagnosis and gender in patients with and without invasive adenoma.

Results: Twenty-seven (23.9%) patients were male with 40.3±12.6 years of age, while female patients’ age was 32.6±8.3 years. Within the 113 patients 45 (39.8%) had evidence of invasive tumour. Invasive group and non-invasive group were 37.6±12.0 years and 32.3±7.9 years old respectively (P<0.01). When compared patient age separately in male and female groups, age difference was not statistically significant in patients with and without invasive adenoma. Considering male patients 81.5% was classified as having invasive adenoma while in female patients invasive adenoma ratio was only 26.7% (P<0.01).

Conclusion: We conclude that male gender is an important risk factor for the invasiveness of prolactin secreting adenomas. Although patients with invasive prolactinoma are slightly older than non-invasive adenomas, the difference disappears when we compare ages in gender subgroups.