Microsurgery vs. Gamma Knife Radiosurgery for the Treatment of Brainstem Cavernous Malformations: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Background: Brainstem cavernous malformations (BSCMs) are a subset of cerebral cavernous malformations with precarious locations and potentially devastating clinical courses. The effects and outcomes of treating BSCMs by microsurgery or gamma knife radiosurgery (GKRS) vary across studies.Methods: We searched the Medline, Web of Science, The Cochrane Library, PubMed, and China Biology Medicine disc databases for original articles published in peer-reviewed journals of cohort studies reporting on 20 or more patients of any age with BSCMs with at least 80% completeness of follow-up.Results: We included 43 cohorts involving 2,492 patients. Both microsurgery (RR = 0.04, 95% CI 0.01–0.16, P < 0.01) and GKRS (RR = 0.11, 95% CI 0.08–0.16, P < 0.01) demonstrated great efficacy in reducing the rehemorrhage rate after treatment for BSCMs. The incidence rates of composite outcomes were 19.8 (95% CI 16.8–22.8) and 15.7 (95% CI 11.7–19.6) after neurosurgery and radiosurgery, respectively. In addition, we found statistically significant differences in the median numbers of patients between neurosurgical and radiosurgical cohorts in terms of symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage (ICH; neurosurgical cohorts: median 0, range 0–33; radiosurgical cohorts: median 4, range 1–14; P < 0.05) and persistent focal neurological deficit (FND; neurosurgical cohorts: median 5, range 0–140; radiosurgical cohorts: median 1, range 0–3; P < 0.05).Conclusions: The reported effects of treating BSCMs by microsurgery or GKRS are favorable for reducing recurrent hemorrhage from BSCMs. Patients in the neurosurgery cohort had a lower incidence of symptomatic ICH, while patients in the radiosurgical cohort had a lower incidence of persistent FND.