• Ravi Medikonda, Kisha Patel, Christina Jackson, Laura Saleh, Siddhartha Srivastava, James Feghali, Aditya Mohan, Ayush Pant, Christopher M Jackson, Jon Weingart, Debraj Mukherjee, Chetan Bettegowda, Gary L Gallia, Henry Brem, and Michael Lim.
• 1Department of Neurosurgery, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland.
• J. Neurosurg. 2022 Apr 1; 136 (4): 106210691062-1069.

ObjectiveIn this single-institution retrospective cohort study, the authors evaluated the effect of dexamethasone on postoperative complications and overall survival in patients with glioma undergoing resection.MethodsA total of 435 patients who underwent resection of a primary glioma were included in this retrospective cohort study. The inclusion criterion was all patients who underwent resection of a primary glioma at a tertiary medical center between 2014 and 2019.ResultsThe use of both pre- and postoperative dexamethasone demonstrated a trend toward the development of postoperative wound infections (3% vs 0% in single use or no use, p = 0.082). No association was detected between dexamethasone use and the development of new-onset hyperglycemia (p = 0.149). On multivariable Cox proportional hazards analysis, dexamethasone use was associated with a greater hazard of death (overall p = 0.017); this effect was most pronounced for preoperative (only) dexamethasone use (hazard ratio 3.0, p = 0.062).ConclusionsCombined pre- and postoperative dexamethasone use may increase the risk of postoperative wound infection, and dexamethasone use, specifically preoperative use, may negatively impact survival. These findings highlight the potential for serious negative consequences with dexamethasone use.

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