Pituitary pathology in Cushing's disease. Histology and morphometry of pituitary tissues removed through microsurgery.

58 cases of Cushing's disease were studied after selective transsphenoidal surgery, by means of histology, immunocytochemistry and morphometry. The qualitative and quantitative results, related to the clinical follow-up of the patients indicated that: 1) when a well-defined tumor was found (62% of the patients), successful outcomes occurred in 88% of the cases, 2) when a tumor could not be found, successful outcomes amounted to only 33% of the cases, a rate that might be related to a surgical exploration of the basophil cell zone "invading" the neural lobe, thus questioning a role of this zone, at least in some Cushing's diseases.