Estrogen receptors in human pituitary tumors

The relationship between the presence of estrogen receptors in pituitary adenomas and the post surgical evolution of the patients in order to find another prognostic parameter for these tumors have been studied to improve the treatment selection. Estrogen receptors were studied by immunocytochemistry in histological sections of paraffin embedded 42 pituitary adenomas. Only 19% of these tumors were positive for estrogen receptors. As expected, the higher concentration (60 %) was found in prolactin secreting adenomas, although we found estrogen receptors in one somatotroph and in one nonsecreting. The most aggressive tumors were those negative for estrogen receptors within the prolactinomas and the positive somatotrophinoma. The results of this work suggest that the determination of estrogen receptors in pituitary tumors might help as a prognostic factor in these adenomas.