What is the pathogenesis of pituitary tumors

Studying the pathogenesis of pituitary tumors is of great reference significance for the treatment of this disease. As a patient, you can properly understand some knowledge about the pathogenesis of the disease, which is of great reference significance for disease prevention and good health care. What is the pathogenesis of pituitary tumors? Let us take a look at the expert’s introduction to the pathogenesis of pituitary tumors.

The pathogenesis of pituitary tumors is a complex multi-step process involving multiple factors, which has not yet been clarified. There are mainly two hypotheses: one is the mechanism of abnormal hypothalamic regulation, and the other is the mechanism of pituitary cell defects. The former believes that the cause originates from the hypothalamus. Under the abnormal regulation of the hypothalamus, it causes hyperfunction and hyperplasia of the pituitary gland, resulting in adenoma; pituitary adenoma is just one of the manifestations of hypothalamic-pituitary dysfunction. The latter believes that local factors in the pituitary gland cause the hyperfunction of pituitary cells, thereby forming adenoma. At present, more and more scholars support that pituitary adenoma originates from the pituitary itself, because the excessive secretion of hormones released by the hypothalamus rarely causes the formation of true adenoma, but only stimulates the proliferation of corresponding pituitary endocrine cells and the increase of corresponding hormone secretion; pituitary microadenoma resection shows that the symptoms of hyperhormonal hyperactivity are rapidly relieved after surgery, and the recurrence rate of long-term follow-up is low; histological studies have shown that there is no hyperplastic tissue surrounding the edge of pituitary adenoma, indicating that pituitary adenoma is not caused by excessive stimulation of hypothalamic hormones.

Analysis of X-chromosome inactivation in heterozygous female pituitary adenoma patients found that all types of pituitary adenomas are monoclonal in origin, while normal pituitary and adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) hyperplasia tissue are polyclonal; pituitary adenomas that secrete multiple hormones originate from primitive multipotent progenitor cells. These data have given us a new understanding of the occurrence of pituitary tumors: pituitary tumors are monoclonal, that is, they originate from an original abnormal cell; the subsequent monoclonal expansion may be due to cell replication and proliferation caused by self-mutation, or due to the intervention of external precipitating factors and the growth factors of the pituitary itself. Therefore, gene mutation may be the most fundamental initiating cause of tumor formation, and hypothalamic hormones and other local growth factors may play a certain synergistic role in the growth of transformed pituitary cells and the enlargement and invasion of tumors. It is now basically unified that the development of pituitary tumors can be divided into two stages-the initiation stage and the promotion stage. In the initiation stage, the defects of pituitary cells themselves are the main cause of onset, and in the promotion stage, factors such as hypothalamic regulation disorders play a major role. That is, a pituitary cell mutates, leading to the activation of oncogenes and/or the inactivation of tumor suppressor genes. Then, under the promotion of internal and external factors, the monoclonal mutant cells continue to proliferate and gradually develop into pituitary tumors.

Larger intracranial tumors can be fatal because they occupy space in the skull, compress brain tissue, and increase intracranial pressure. Pituitary tumors account for about 10% of intracranial tumors. The pituitary gland is an important endocrine organ in the human body. Pituitary tumors can cause varying degrees of hypopituitarism in the pituitary gland.