ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Oncol.
Sec. Neuro-Oncology and Neurosurgical Oncology
Volume 15 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fonc.2025.1531879
Different risk factors for multiple and unifocal gliomas: a comparative study of radiological, pathological and clinical characteristics
Provisionally accepted
- 1Department of Radiology, Beijing Tiantan Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China
- 2Department of Radiology, The Affiliated Children’s Hospital, Capital Institute of Pediatrics, Beijing, China
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Background: This retrospective study compared two types of gliomas and two subtypes of multiple gliomas.The clinical manifestations, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) findings, pathological characteristics, and clinical outcomes of 188 patients with unifocal and 94 patients with multiple gliomas (59 with multifocal and 35 with multicentric gliomas) were analysed.Compared with patients with unifocal glioma, those with multiple gliomas were older (P=0.001) and more likely to be male (χ 2 =4.857, P=0.028). Patients with multiple gliomas had smaller extent of surgical resection (χ 2 =161.016, P<0.001) and a worse prognosis (χ 2 =43.733, P<0.001) than those with unifocal gliomas. Multiple gliomas were more likely to have a nonsuperficial location (χ 2 =51.758, P<0.001), obvious peritumoral oedema (χ 2 =9.688, P=0.008), intense enhancement (χ 2 =24.547, P<0.001), a higher WHO grade (P=0.001), a lower ratio of isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH) mutation (χ 2 =51.770, P<0.001), and codeletion of 1p19q (χ 2 =8.637, P=0.003).Tumour location and IDH status were identified as independent risk factors for multiple gliomas (P<0.001 and P=0.003, respectively). Deep tumor location was found to be the only factor related to unfavorable overall survival (OS) in multiple gliomas. Patients with multifocal gliomas were more likely to be male than patients with multicentric gliomas (χ 2 =6.521, P=0.011). The locations of multifocal and multicentric gliomas were significantly different (P=0.048). WHO grade was identified as an independent prognostic factor (P=0.034) in patients with multicentric gliomas but not in those with multifocal gliomas.The demographic characteristics, extent of resection, radiological features, pathological features and prognostic factors differ between patients with multiple gliomas and those with unifocal gliomas. The clinical and radiological features differ between patients with different subtypes of multiple gliomas. Multiple gliomas located only in superficial regions are more likely to be multicentric gliomas and the prognosis is solely related to the WHO grades, providing valuable guidance for clinical treatment.
Keywords: Multicentric gliomas, Multifocal gliomas, diagnosis, differentiation, prognosis
Received: 28 Nov 2024; Accepted: 06 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Feng, Shi, Zang and Chen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Xuzhu Chen, Department of Radiology, Beijing Tiantan Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China
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