Transnaso-Sphenoidal Approach to Skull Base Lesions Other than Pituitary Adenomas

Since its technical refinement and popularization by Hardy, the transnaso-sphenoidal (TNS) approach in microsurgery has increasingly been used for entering the sella turcica. Besides the removal of pituitary adenomas, which is the chief indication, this route allows the treatment of other intrasellar lesions as well as of some tumors of the sphenoid sinus and the clivus. In our Department the ratio of pituitary adenomas to other lesions treated by the TNS approach is 5:1. We present 36 cases of skull base lesions other than pituitary adenomas approached transsphenoidally during the last 9 years.