Intramedullary spinal cord tumors

Comparison of the incidence of the various types of spinal tumors in infancy and childhood to other age groups reveals significant differences, similar to the brain tumors. Compared with intramedullary tumors in adult patients (16%), the incidence of intramedul1ary bIastomas is higher in children and young adults (1-16 years) (25%). Intramedullary tumors become prevalently manifest as gliomas (about 80%), i.e. neoplasms ofthe neuroglial tissue of the spinal cord. Among the glioma subspecies, astrocytomas playa major part, almost paral1eled by ependymomas in terms of incidence. Malignant types such as glioblastomas are rarely seen. Moreover, a large number of neuroepithelial tumors are referred to as «gliomas» in the literature, though without any precise histologic c1assification. The majority of these blastomas are fibrillary astrocytomas and ependymomas. In addition to the described intramedul1ary tumors there are a number of other intramedul1ary neoplasms ofmesodermal and ectodermal origino These prevalently inc1ude congenital and embryonic tumors and angioblastomas (about 12 %), and isolated instances of neoplasms such as sarcomas. The remaining intramedul1ary processes comprise around 8 % of al1 intramedul1ary tumors and inc1ude abscesses, granulomas, vascular malformations, cysts, etc.