Hormones and Cancer Group

Pituitary tumours make up 10% of all brain tumours and are found in up to 25% of individuals at autopsy. Clinically significant pituitary tumours occur in just over one in every 1,000 individuals. They are commonly found in young or middle-aged adults. A small subset of pituitary tumours behave in an aggressive manner. These are associated with significant morbidity – either through disease or the requirement for multiple treatment modalities–and increased mortality.

Our aim is to continue to advance methods of detection, management and treatment of pituitary disease, and be recognised as a centre of pituitary excellence. Our areas of interest include:

• Utilising genomic technologies to:
• identify patients with pituitary tumours that may carry genetic abnormalities that predispose the development of pituitary tumours
• determine new treatment targets for aggressive pituitary tumours
• Utilising biomarkers to improve pituitary tumour classification (advances in knowledge and histopathological evaluations)
• Developing guidelines on the management of aggressive pituitary tumours
• Maintaining our unique bioresource that stores samples from consenting patients with pituitary disease. This resource provides the foundation for future tumour research, facilitating tumour-clinical correlation and translational research
• Quality of Life (QoL) data following pituitary surgery.

Our recent research has focused on the development of a model based on clinical, imaging and pathological characteristics of pituitary tumours that may better predict the risk of aggressive tumour behaviour. We have also begun to examine the role of the immune system in the development of pituitary tumours.