Pituitary metastases are rare and account for only 1% of all operated pituitary masses 1) 2) and <1% of all intracranial metastatic lesions. Most cases are asymptomatic and are incidentally discovered during an autopsy or in patients during the end-stage malignant course, and characteristic symptoms are reported in <20% 3).
With the improvement of neuroimaging techniques and the increased survival of cancer patients, most cases of PM are generally diagnosed as a complication of disseminated malignancies with metastatic spread to other organs (80% of the reported cases). Only in 20–30% of the cases, PM is the initial presentation of an unknown primary tumor and precedes the diagnosis of malignancy 4).
The majority of affected patients are diagnosed between the age of 45 and 74 years with a mean age of ∼60 years 5) 6).