What is Cavernous Sinus?

To understand what is the cavernous sinus, one needs to understand the structure of human head to some extent. The cavernous sinus, also known as lateral sellar compartment are located within the human head. A large collection of veins constituted of veins with thin walls create this cavity, which is on one side bordered by the temporal bone and on the other by the sphenoid bone of the skull.

What constitutes the cavernous sinus is something like this. Vertically it comprises of trochlear nerve, maxillary nerve, oculomotor nerve and ophthalmic nerve. Horizontally it is made up of abducens nerve and internal carotid artery as well as sympathetic plexus. And as can be easily guessed, all these nerves give it a very complex and delicate character. So it can be safely argued that what cavernous sinus is, is nothing but a cavity in our skull to hold a disparate number of nerves. In this respect we also find that there is similarity between any other sinus and cavernous sinus by virtue of being a cavity in the skull.

Now coming to the connections of the veins, we find that it has got tributaries from both inferior and superior ophthalmic veins, middle and superior cerebral veins and superior parietal sinus. It is the only such anatomical location in our body where an artery has to travel completely through a structure of veins. So if someone is to ask what is unique about cavernous sinus, then it is undoubtedly this. Though this not to negate its similarities with other sinuses.

Our understanding of what is cavernous sinus gets both enhanced and complicated as well when we take into account the fact that pituitary gland lies nowhere else but very much between the two paired cavernous sinuses. Any abnormal growth of pituitary adenoma when expands in a particular direction where there is least resistance, it causes the compression of cavernous sinus. This compression results in cavernous sinus syndrome because of these tumors and ultimately results in opthalmoplegia which is loss of ophthalmic sensory loss while the compression of maxillary nerve causes maxillary sensory loss.

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