In this article, we will discuss the Clinical Presentations of Pituitary Apoplexy. So, let’s get started.
Signs and Symptoms
- Headache, sudden and severe retro-orbital and frontal pain
- Decreased visual acquity and visual field defects
- Opthalmoplegia, ptosis, and pupilary defects
- Nausea, vomiting, headache, alteration in the level of consciousness, e.g. lethargy, stupor, and coma
- Hemiplegia
- Acute adrenal insufficiency
- Gonadal dysfunction
- Diabetes insipidus
- Hypofunction of thyroid
- Fever, anosmia, CSF rhinorrhea, and facial pain, respiratory and cardiac rhythm disturbances
Structure involved/compressed
- Sudden enlargement of tumor mass
- Optic nerve
- The III,IV, and VI cranial nerve compression
- Meningeal irritation (disruption of dura or leakage of blood into subarachnoid space)
- Internal carotid artery
- Compression of corticotrophs (loss of ACTH)
- Compression of gonadotrophs (loss of LH, FSH)
- Compression of pituitary stalk
- Compression of thyrotrophs
- Nonspecific, noncompressive