[Foix-Alajouanine syndrome, what is it?].

The article contains the description of Foix-Alajouanine syndrome (FAS) from literature. Three our own cases of FAS, which developed in two men and one woman, are presented. An analysis of FAS clinical picture revealed a step-like progression of the disease with a possibility of short-term fluctuation of some focal neurological signs. Five stages of clinical course of FAS were detected. Some peculiar sings of spinal neurovisualization, together with serum and cerebro-spinal fluid (CSF) laboratory examinations, were indicated in FAS. Surgery is first-choice of FAS treatment. Pharmacological treatment with high doses of anticoagulants, together with antiviral therapy (and antibiotics, if necessary), neuroprotectors, antiedematic and symptomatic therapy must be started early. Prevention of thrombotic, trophic and purulent complications is required.

[Pericranial sinus. Definition, diagnosis, surgical treatment].

Pericranial sinus (Sinus pericranii - SP) is a rare pathology of the extra-intracranial cerebral venous system. However, SP is not just an additional transosseous canal that connects the extra- and intracranial venous systems. This "emissary vein" connects the intracranial sinus and the variceally extended thin-walled veins localized on the outer surface of the skull where blood flows fun in opposite directions. We present a literature review and two case reports of patients with pericranial sinus who underwent surgical treatment. We discuss the problems related to etiology, clinical signs, diagnosis, and surgical treatment of the anomaly.

[Bifurcational diverticulum ("aneurisms") of brain arterial junctions].

The results of clinico-morfological investigation of 220 arteries of the brain base from dead patients with aneurisms are in the article. The new facts and terms such as bifurcational hemodynamic aneurisms, segmental arterial ring of the brain and aneurysmal disease of the brain have been introduced. We have showed that aneurisms forms in the area of bifurcation, but not in linear segments of vessels. A junction of arteries in the bifurcation of vessels, formed by connective tissue, units muscle segments and takes place in development of aneurisms. The term of "aneurism" as a saccular evagination of all layers of arterial wall was prejudiced. A term as "diverticulum" could be use for denomination of evagination. Two types of aneurysmal disease of the brain clinical course have been separated out. The fist one is dysembryoplastic type with connective tissue deficiency and the second one--involutional hypertensive type at patients with long-term arterial hypertension.

[Metastatic glioblastoma in a submandibular lymph node (a rare case)].

Extraneural metastases from glioblastoma are rare. A case of metastatic right parietal lobe glioblastoma in cervical node after repeat craniotomy is presented.

[Use of postmortem brain magnetic resonance imaging at autopsy].

The study was undertaken to define the possibilities of using postmortem MRI for examining the brain. A complex study was made to explore 21 neutral formalin-fixed gross brain specimens from patients with neurosurgical pathology. Macroscopic and target histological studies of the changed signal areas detected by MRI were performed using histochemical stains. The significance of the results obtained by MRI in vitro has been defined, which furnish considerable opportunities to use the technique for the postmortem diagnosis of various diseases, to detect macroscopically undetectable changes (perifocal changes, metastases), to make a complex of intractable diagnostic problems, and to study the histological substrate of changed MR signal areas.