Background: Although rare, the co-occurrence of multiple sclerosis (MS) and glioma poses unique challenges in terms of diagnosis and management for both neurologists and neuro-oncologists.
Methods: Here we report on a single-center cohort of four patients with a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis who developed gliomas.
Results: Our cohort reflects the epidemiology of glioma in terms of the relative frequency of IDH-wildtype and IDH-mutant cases. The patients in 3 out of the 4 cases presented did not develop their tumors in areas of pre-existing demyelinating lesions.
Conclusions: We did not find evidence to support the hypothesis that chronic gliosis from demyelinating plaques may serve as a substrate for secondary induction of a glial neoplasm. In our Discussion, we provide recommendations for distinguishing neoplastic from demyelinating lesions, review the evidence for demyelination as a risk factor for gliomagenesis, and highlight important considerations for the concurrent management of glioma and MS.
Keywords: Glioma; autoimmune diseases of the nervous system; demyelinating diseases; glioblastoma; multiple sclerosis.
© The Author(s) 2022.