Chordomas in the clival-cervical region present challenges to the neurosurgical team due to their encroaching nature, proximity to critical neurovascular structures and often large size due to late presentation. This report illustrates the utility of a staged approach when confronted with such a pervasive tumour. We describe the adaptive combination of two approaches, the endoscopic endonasal t...

We report the cytological findings of a sacro-coccygeal chordoma in a 53 year male diagnosed preoperatively by guided fine needle aspiration cytology. The smears shows characteristic Physalliphorous cells in a metachromatic background of myxoid material entrapping cords of cuboidal cells. Differential diagnosis in cytology include conventional and myxoid chondrosarcoma, myxoid liposarcoma, myxo...

A 30-year-old man presented with recurrent headaches. CT head revealed a clival chordoma (figure 1A). Chordomas originate from the embryonic remnants of the notochord and account for 2%–4% of all malignant bone tumors. They have a predilection for the axial skeleton, with 35% affecting the spheno-occipital region. The incidence peaks at ages 20–40 years. Male patients are affected twice Figure ...

Chordomas are rare tumours which arise from remnants of the primitive notochord. They occur primarily in the sacrum, clivus and cervical regions. We report a case of retroclival chordoma which presented as an extradural haemorrhage following minor trauma. The underlying tumour was not apparent on imaging performed immediately following the event, and chordoma presenting in this manner has not p...

Chordomas are locally aggressive malignant tumors of notochordal origin whose metastatic potential is increasingly recognized. Surgical pathway recurrence has been noted only rarely in the literature. We present three patients with clival chordomas whose sole or initial recurrence was along the pathway of prior surgical access. A characteristic mass found along the pathway of prior surgical acc...

We have treated 175 patients with a chordoma over a ten-year period. Only two had a family history of the condition and we describe these in this paper. In one patient the tumour was at the craniocervical junction and in the other the lesion affected the sacrum. We have undertaken a literature review of familial chordoma and have identified chromosomal abnormalities associated with the condition.

In this case report, we describe an extraosseous chordoma in the coccygeal region that later metastasized to the cerebellum. A 30-year-old man presented with a progressively enlarged lesion in the coccygeal region with painful sensation. Preoperative computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging showed a large lobular mass in the coccygeal region without sacrococcygeal destruction. Patholo...

Brachyury is a transcription factor which is required for posterior mesoderm formation and differentiation as well as for notochord development during embryogenesis. Due to its expression in the neoplastic cells of chordoma, a malignant tumour deriving from notochordal remnants, but not in tumors showing a similar histology, brachyury has been proposed as a diagnostic marker of this neoplasia. ...

BACKGROUND Chordoma is a rare invasive bone tumor that may occur anywhere along the neuraxis. A total of three primary histological varieties have been identified: conventional, chondroid, and dedifferentiated. CASE PRESENTATION We report a case of an 8-year-old white girl who presented with conventional chordoma, was treated with surgical resection and mixed proton and photon beam therapy, a...

Chondroid chordoma is an extremely rare tumour with an annual incidence of around 0.1 cases per 100,000population. Involvement of the thoracic vertebrae may be present in 2-5% of cases. Definitive diagnosis usually requires a suitable distinction between this and other mesenchymal tumours such as chondrosarcomas, so immunohistochemical analysis is virtually mandatory. In spite of its slow-growi...