Microsurgical technique is essential for neurosurgeons, which demands good hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills. It is therefore necessary to provide systematic microsurgical training for young doctors with limited clinical experience. However, there is currently a lack of unified training programs in China. Based on clinical needs, the Neurosurgery Department of Peking Union Medical College Hospital has developed an integrated, immersive, and high-intensity microsurgical training course that covers training closely related to clinical practice, such as the use of microsurgical instruments, suture of gauze holes, anastomosis of artificial blood vessels, anastomosis of middle cerebral artery, and the use of micro drills. Since March 2022, six training sessions have been completed with a total of 12 trainees, and all have passed the assessment. Four of them have been recognized as microsurgical main surgeons. Preliminary data shows that this training course has helped to improve the microsurgical skills of young neurosurgeons, providing a reference for future microsurgical training programs.

Glioma is the most common primary malignant tumor of the central nervous system in adults. Despite the standard treatment of surgery combined with radiotherapy and chemotherapy, the prognosis for high-grade glioma patients remains poor, highlighting the urgent need to further explore its pathogenesis and develop new therapeutic strategies. This article reviews the research progress in the field of glioma in China in 2024, covering tumorigenesis mechanisms, tumor immune microenvironment composition, advances in imaging techniques and novel imaging agents, improvements in surgical approaches, mechanisms of radio- and chemoresistance, and explorations of new therapeutic modalities. These studies provide a solid theoretical foundation for advancing clinical diagnosis and treatment of gliomas and may offer new opportunities to improve patient outcomes.

Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common primary central nervous system tumor, whose prognosis remains poor under the sequential standard of care, such as neurosurgery followed by concurrent temozolomide radiochemotherapy and adjuvant temozolomide chemotherapy in the presence or absence of tumor treating fields. Accordingly, the advent of molecular targeted therapy and immunotherapy has opened a new era of tumor management. A diverse range of targeted drugs have been tested in patients with GBM in phase Ⅲ clinical trials. However, these drugs are ineffective for all patients, as evidenced by the fact that only a minority of patients in these trials showed prolonged survival. Furthermore, there are several published phase Ⅲ clinical trials that involve immune checkpoint inhibitors, peptide vaccines, dendritic cell vaccines, and virotherapy. Accordingly, this review comprehensively overviews existing studies of targeted drugs and immunotherapy for glioma and discusses the challenge and perspective of targeted drugs and immunotherapy for glioma to clarify future directions.

Brain metastases (BMs) are the most common cause of intracranial neoplasms in adults with poor prognosis. Most BMs originate from lung cancer, breast cancer, or melanoma. Radiotherapy (RT), including whole brain radiotherapy (WBRT) and stereotactic radiation surgery (SRS), has been widely explored and is considered a mainstay anticancer treatment for BMs. Over the past decade, the advent of novel systemic therapies has revolutionized the treatment of BMs. In this context, there is a strong rationale for using a combination of treatments based on RT, with the aim of achieving both local disease control and extracranial disease control. This review focuses on describing the latest progress in RT as well as the synergistic effects of the optimal combinations of RT and systemic treatment modalities for BMs, to provide perspectives on current treatments.