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Updated: Feb 23, 2026
Image-Guided Resection of Glioblastoma and Intracranial Implantation of Therapeutic Stem Cell-seeded Scaffolds
Published on: July 16, 2018
Fluorescence-Guided versus Conventional Surgical Resection of High Grade Glioma: A Single-Centre, 7-Year, Comparative
Wei Ping Ng1,2, Boon Seng Liew1, Zamzuri Idris2
1Department of Neurosurgery, Hospital Sungai Buloh, Jalan Hospital, 47000 Sungai Buloh, Selangor, Malaysia.
Background:
High grade gliomas (HGGs) are locally invasive brain tumours that carry a dismal prognosis. Although complete resection increases median survival, the difficulty in reliably demonstrating the tumour border intraoperatively is a norm. The Department of Neurosurgery, Hospital Sungai Buloh is the first public hospital in Malaysia to overcome this problem by adopting fluorescence-guided (FG) surgery using 5-aminolevulinic acid (5-ALA).
Methods:
A total of 74 patients with histologically proven HGGs treated between January 2008 and December 2014, who fulfilled the inclusion criteria, were enrolled. Kaplan-Meier survival estimates and Cox proportional hazard regression were used.
Results:
Significant longer survival time (months) was observed in the FG group compared with the conventional group (12 months versus 8 months, P < 0.020). Even without adjuvant therapy, HGG patients from FG group survived longer than those from the conventional group (8 months versus 3 months, P = 0.006). No significant differences were seen in postoperative Karnofsky performance scale (KPS) between the groups at 6 weeks and 6 months after surgery compared to pre-operative KPS. Cox proportional hazard regression identified four independent predictors of survival: KPS > 80 (P = 0.010), histology (P < 0.001), surgical method (P < 0.001) and adjuvant therapy (P < 0.001).
Conclusion:
This study showed a significant clinical benefit for HGG patients in terms of overall survival using FG surgery as it did not result in worsening of post-operative function outcome when compared with the conventional surgical method. We advocate a further multicentered, randomised controlled trial to support these findings before FG surgery can be implemented as a standard surgical adjunct in local practice for the benefit of HGG patients.
