title: Surgery or gamma -knife for the treatment of arteriovenous malformations?
abstract: Decision making for either surgery or gamma-knife for the treatment of arteriovenous malformations (AVMs) cannot be uniform. The skill of the neurosurgeon in operating on AVMs is now being compared with that of the gamma-knife. The decision varies from case to case and is to be taken by the neurosurgeon. This report presents three cases in which such decision making was not easy. Case 1 was a non-ruptured cingulate AVM of 2.5 cm diameter in the cingulate cortex. The operative field was anticipated to be very narrow between the parietal bridging veins. Case 2 was a tiny ruptured AVM in the speech-motor area which was buried underneath the cortex. Case 3 was a large ruptured thalamo-stiriate-capsular AVM with feeders from the anterior and posterior choroidal arteries. All cases were operated without serious morbidity. A combination of pre-operative intravascular surgery (cases 1 and 3) or postoperative gamma-knife (case 3) was adopted. In conclusion, there is no unitary rule to decide on surgery or gamma-knife for the treatment of AVMs. It depends on what good or harm the responsible surgeon or the gamma-knife does.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosurgery, Kanto Rosai Hospital, Kanagawa, Japan.. taku-sgn@ja2.so-net.ne.jp
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Shigeno
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Atsuchi
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tanaka
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Goto
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ogata
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D002538:Intracranial Arteriovenous Malformations / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000601:surgery*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016634:Radiosurgery / Q000379:methods; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed; D014656:Vascular Surgical Procedures / Q000379:methods