1/3. Intraspinal osteogenic meningioma: report of a case. Dense calcification and psammomatous bodies are common in spinal meningioma, but are rarely reported in osteogenic meningioma. We present a 73-year-old woman with an extramedullary, intradural tumor located at the T5 vertebra. The tumor showed mixed intensity and heterogeneous enhancement on the T1-weighted image and hypointensity on the T2-weighted image, and was situated near the spinal nerve root. The tumor's initial symptom was myelopathy, as is usual with spinal meningioma. We successfully removed the tumor under microscopy and found it to be separated from the vertebral column by the epidural space. The symptoms and signs improved gradually after the operation. Because the pathologic examination revealed areas of lamellar bone with bone marrow in the transitional meningioma, and because these were not related to the psammomatous bodies, osteogenic meningioma was diagnosed. metaplasia of arachnoid cells is considered to be the putative etiology of osteogenic meningioma. ( info) |
| Metaplastic breast carcinoma, a rare entity, accounts for only about 0.02% of all breast carcinomas. It involves the transformation of mammary neoplasms into osteoid and chondroid substances. Because of the relatively small patient population and the limited number of controlled studies, there is confusion regarding its classification and staging. Its histogenesis is unknown. The authors describe a 65-year-old woman with findings consistent with metaplastic breast carcinoma. Theories as to etiology and prognosis as well as treatment are discussed. ( info) |
3/3. Magnetic resonance chemical shift imaging in bone and soft tissue tumours. A study was carried out in 14 patients to assess the location and differential diagnosis of bone and soft tissue tumours with a 0.5 Tesla scanner, using water and fat images obtained by the three-point Dixon technique. We compared the magnetic resonance imaging findings obtained with this technique with conventional MRI, T1-T2-weighted images, and gadalinium-diethylenetriamine penta-acetic acid enhanced T1-weighted images. Localisation was better with the three-point Dixon technique than with conventional magnetic resonance imaging. Differentiation between the fat and water component around the tumour was possible. The gadalinium-diethylenetriamine penta-acetic acid enhanced water images were very sensitive to enhancement of the tissue. The three-point Dixon technique is useful when the tumour area is difficult to detect by conventional magnetic resonance imaging and information about its components is needed; these images can be made at the low magnet field. ( info) |