Childhood Astrocytomas Treatment (PDQ®)–Health Professional Version

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Changes to this Summary (01/24/2018)

The PDQ cancer information summaries are reviewed regularly and updated as new information becomes available. This section describes the latest changes made to this summary as of the date above.

General Information About Childhood Astrocytomas

Revised text to state that BRAF V600E point mutations are occasionally observed in pilocytic astrocytoma; the mutations are also observed in nonpilocytic pediatric low-grade gliomas, including ganglioglioma, desmoplastic infantile ganglioglioma, and approximately two-thirds of pleomorphic xanthoastrocytomas.

Added text about a retrospective series that included 400 children with low-grade gliomas and reported on incidence rates of BRAF V600E mutations and the prognosis of these patients (cited Lassaletta et al. as reference 38).

The High-grade gliomas subsection in the Genomic Alterations section was extensively revised.

Added Gnekow et al. as reference 66.

Treatment of Childhood Low-Grade Astrocytomas

Added text to state that a multicenter, prospective, randomized trial that compared treatment with vincristine/carboplatin with vincristine/carboplatin plus etoposide in children with low-grade glioma failed to demonstrate a difference in progression-free survival and overall survival between the two regimens (cited Gnekow et al. as reference 53 and level of evidence 1iiD).

This summary is written and maintained by the PDQ Pediatric Treatment Editorial Board, which is editorially independent of NCI. The summary reflects an independent review of the literature and does not represent a policy statement of NCI or NIH. More information about summary policies and the role of the PDQ Editorial Boards in maintaining the PDQ summaries can be found on the About This PDQ Summary and PDQ® - NCI's Comprehensive Cancer Database pages.

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