Double crush syndrome caused by cervical spondylosis and vertebral artery loop.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this article is to report a successful treatment experience in a rare case of simultaneous cervical nerve root compression by spondylotic cervical foraminal stenosis and a vertebral artery loop. METHODS: 51-year-old man presented with a 4-year history of left-sided cervical pain radiating to the left shoulder with progressive exacerbation of weakness on left shoulder girdle muscles for 7 months. The patient had no history of trauma. The patient's CT and MRI revealed impingement of the left C6 cervical nerve root by a tortuous vertebral artery loop and also by narrowed left C5-6 cervical foramen that had undergone spondylotic changes. The patient underwent left C5-6 hemilaminectomy, facetectomy and C5-6 fusion. The procedures were uneventful, and the patient recovered with complete resolution of symptoms. RESULTS: The patient continued to be asymptomatic at a 2-year follow-up examination, and the muscle mass of his left girdle returned normal. CONCLUSIONS: This report illustrates the first phenomenon of a double crush syndrome caused by vertebral artery loop and cervical spondylotic changes. When patients with cervical spondylosis present with unexplainably severe pain and weakness, additional underlying pathologies should be considered when making differential diagnoses. The investigation planning should involve electromyography, computed tomography angiography, and magnetic resonance imaging.

Diagnostic Clue of Meningeal Melanocytoma: Case Report and Review of Literature.

In this report, the patient was pre-diagnosed as meningioma before surgery, which turned out to be meningeal melanocytoma. Hence, we will discuss the interpretation of imaging and neurological statuses that may help avoid this problem. A 45-year-old man had increasing pain around the neck 14 months prior to admission. His cervical spine MR imaging revealed a space-occupying, contrast-enhancing mass within the dura at the level of C1. The neurologic examination revealed that the patient had left-sided lower extremity weakness of 4+, decreased sensation on the right side, and hyperreflexia in both legs. Department of Neuroradiology interpreted CT and MR imaging as meningiom. The patient underwent decompression and removal of the mass. We confirmed diagnosis as meningeal melanocytoma through pathologic findings. Afterwards, we reviewed the patient's imaging work-up, which showed typical findings of meningeal melanocytoma. However, it was mistaken as meningioma, since the disease is rare.

Metastatic Intracranial Hemangiopericytoma to the Spinal Column: A Case Report.

Intracranial hemangiopericytoma (HPC) is a rare brain tumor with aggressive biologic behavior associated with high recurrence rate and often with extracranial metastasis. The most common sites of extracranial metastasis of the intracranial HPC are the long bones, lung, liver and abdominal cavity in the order of frequencies. Extracranial metastases usually occur long after the initial diagnosis of the primary tumor. Metastatic intracranial HPC to the vertebra has been rarely reported. We present a case of intracranial HPC metastasized to the L2 vertebral body 13 years after multiple surgical resections and radiotherapy of the primary intracranial HPC.

Risk factors predicting the new symptomatic vertebral compression fractures after percutaneous vertebroplasty or kyphoplasty.

INTRODUCTION: Percutaneous vertebroplasty (PVP) and percutaneous kyphoplasty (PKP) are effective procedures to alleviate pain caused by osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures (VCFs). New vertebral compression fracture (NVCF) has been noted as a potential late sequela of the procedures. The incidence of NVCFs and affecting risk factors were investigated. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The authors retrospectively analyzed the occurrence of NVCFs in 147 patients treated with PVP or PKP for osteoporotic VCFs. Possible risk factors, such as age, gender, body mass index, bone mineral density (BMD), location of treated vertebra, treatment modality, amount of bone cement injected, anterior-posterior ratio of the fractured vertebra, cement leakage into the disc space, and pattern of cement distribution, were assessed. RESULTS: Twenty-seven patients (18.4%) had subsequent symptomatic NVCFs with a median time to new fracture was of 70 days. The 1-year symptomatic fracture-free rate was 85.0% by the Kaplan-Meier estimate. Eighteen (66.7%) of the 27 patients had an NVCF on the adjacent vertebra. Significant differences (P < 0.05) were found between the NVCF and control groups in regard to age, treatment modality, BMD, and the proportion of cement leakage into the disc space. Discal cement leakage and low BMD affected on adjacent NVCFs. CONCLUSION: The most important risk factors affecting NVCFs were osteoporosis and intervertebral discal cement leakage.