Surgical Resection of Anterior and Posterior Butterfly Glioblastoma

Evidence suggests a survival benefit for patients with glioblastoma who undergo maximal safe surgical resection. Not all glioblastomas are amenable to surgical resection and anatomic location is one potentially limiting factor. Glioblastomas that invade the corpus callosum and cross midline to the contralateral hemisphere—butterfly glioblastomas (bGBMs)—are one subgroup of tumors traditionally deemed inoperable. We evaluate the management of bGBMs at our institution to assess whether surgical resection is feasible, safe, and more effective than biopsy. We retrospectively reviewed our institutional brain tumor registry for all adult patients treated for glioblastoma (World Health Organization grade IV) between 2004 and 2016 to identify all bGBMs. Survival between biopsy and resection was assessed using the Kaplan-Meier model. Twenty-nine (3.8%) of 764 newly diagnosed GBMs were identified as bGBM. Of these, 9 patients (31.0%) underwent surgical resection and 20 patients (69.0%) underwent biopsy. Five patients (55.6%) in the surgical resection group had 98% extent of resection or greater. Median survival of our entire cohort of patients was 3.3 months. Median survival was higher in the surgical resection groups (7.8 vs. 2.8 months; P = 0.0019). Increased age is independently associated with increased risk of death, and adjuvant therapy is independently associated with prolonged survival. Surgical resection of butterfly glioblastoma prolongs survival without increased risk of permanent neurologic deficit. Both anterior and posterior bGBMs can be resected safely.