However, the classic radiographic image for lymphoma is a homogenous, rather than ring-enhancing lesion. In addition, a perivascular and intramural consolidation of neoplastic cells is characteristic of lymphoma, and can be effectively displayed by the use of a reticulin stain. Cytologic studies can also be useful in ruling out lymphoma, as well as metastatic carcinoma, and other cellular, vascular or reactive lesions. Cytologic preparations of GBM reveal small cells with glassy eosinophilic cytoplasm, slender filamentous processes, and relatively elongated nuclei lacking prominent nucleoli. Clinical Course Median survival for GBM is fourteen weeks post-surgery and supportive care.
Radiation therapy can extend survival for up to one year.
However, nearly all patients are dead within two years of diagnosis. Radiation, can in some patients, halt the progression of rapid tumor enlargement and cause a post-radiation stage of remission. This stage is characterized by stability, or sometimes regression of neurologic deficits. Other patients are unaffected by radiation therapy and the tumor continues to enlarge, accompanied by increasing neurologic deficits. However, if remission occurs, it is usually brief and within one year the tumor has recurred in or around the initial tumor bed.