World neurosurgery
October 5, 2026 · via Europe PMC
Transcription Factor Immunohistochemistry Improves Diagnostic Accuracy and Reduces Immunonegative Misclassification in Nonfunctional Pituitary Neuroendocrine Tumors.
Hanks T, Abecassis ZA, Eaton J, +17 more, Ruzevick J.
AI summary — for doctors, generated from the abstract only
Staining for lineage transcription factors classified many nonfunctional pituitary tumors that hormone staining alone would have missed, cutting immunonegative misclassification.
What was studied
Single-institution retrospective study of 173 surgically resected nonfunctional pituitary neuroendocrine tumors (2021-2024) with both hormone IHC and lineage-specific transcription factor staining (SF-1, PIT-1, T-PIT), plus a literature review.
Key findings
- SF-1, PIT-1 and T-PIT were positive in 117 (66%), 18 (10%) and 35 (20%) tumors; only 3 (2%) were negative for all.
- Of 117 SF-1 tumors, 32 (27%) had no LH/FSH staining.
- Of 170 tumors positive for a single TF, 41 (24%) lacked staining for the corresponding hormone.
Clinical relevance
Pathologists and pituitary surgeons may find transcription factor testing gives more accurate lineage classification than hormone IHC alone.
Who should care
Limitations
Retrospective single-center series; the abstract is cut off before any outcome or prognostic correlations, so clinical impact is not shown here.
Adding transcription factor staining may reduce the number of tumors wrongly labeled immunonegative.
This is an AI-generated summary of the published abstract, not a clinical recommendation. It may not reflect the full text or subsequent updates — verify against the original source before acting on it.
Abstract
Objective
Anterior pituitary hormone immunohistochemistry (IHC) for surgically resected nonfunctional pituitary neuroendocrine tumors (NF PitNET) underreports true rates of tumor lineage and biases toward immunonegative tumors. Here we compare our use of traditional IHC methods for identification of anterior pituitary hormones versus identification of lineage specific transcription factors (TF) to correctly identify NF PitNET lineage and review the literature for studies evaluating its efficacy.
Methods
A single institution, retrospective study of NF PitNETs undergoing surgical resection between 2021 and 2024 at the University of [blinded for review] was performed. Patients were included for study if pathology specimens had IHC performed for anterior pituitary hormones and lineage specific TF.
Results
A total of 173 patients with NF PitNETs were included. When stained for the lineage specific TFs: SF-1, PIT-1, and T-PIT, immunoreactivity was observed in 117 (66%), 18 (10%), and 35 (20%) tumors, respectively. Three (2%) patients demonstrated no positive staining for any TF and were classified as immunonegative. Of the 117 SF-1 tumors, 32 (27%) showed no positive staining for LH/FSH. For the 18 PIT-1 tumors, two (11%) showed no positive staining for PRL/GH/TSH. For the 35 TPIT tumors, 7 (20%) showed no staining for ACTH. Overall, of the 170 patients who had positive staining for a single TF, 41 (24%) did not show IHC staining for their corresponding anterior pituitary hormones and thus would have been classified as immunonegative PitNETs.
Conclusion
Use of IHC for identification of lineage specific TF markedly improves the accuracy of correct pathological diagnosis of NF PitNETs.
DOI
10.1016/j.wneu.2026.125390
PMID
42833555
Research metadata (titles, abstracts, authors, publication dates) is sourced from Europe PMC, which aggregates content from PubMed/MEDLINE, PubMed Central, and other providers under the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM/NCBI). NLM does not claim copyright on abstracts; the original journal publishers or authors may hold rights to the full articles. AI-generated summaries are derived only from the abstract, never the full text, and are always labeled as AI-generated.
Want more like this?
Browse more from the feed. A free account unlocks the full feed, saving and communities.
Back to the research feed