A malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor (MPNST) is an extremely rare soft tissue tumor in the general population. On the other hand, there is a higher incidence of MPNST in patients with neurofibromatosis type I (von Recklinghausen's disease). The common sites are the extremities, trunk, head and neck. However, an intraabdominal or intrathoracic manifestation is uncommon. This paper reports t...

A previously fit and healthy 26-year-old lady with no significant medical history presented with a two-month history of headaches. The headaches were prolonged, generalised, and unusually severe for the patient. Examination revealed papilloedema. The patient's optic nerve sheath diameter was measured 3 mm posterior to the globe and found to be 7.5 mm. The patient subsequently had computed tomog...

Malignant mesenchymoma within the right ulnar nerve of an 8 year old boy is described. The patient did not have stigmata of von Recklinghausen's neurofibromatosis. The growing and painful tumour was excised five and a half detection, and recurred five months later. Mingling of the nerve sheath sarcoma and rhabdomyosarcoma was noted within the same mass which was separated from the adjacent stri...

Schwannoma is a benign encapsulated nerve sheath tumor composed of Schwann cells, that may arise anywhere along the course nerve. Cutaneous schwannomas, associated with peripheral nerves, usually present as slow-growing well-circumscribed nodule, localized in dermis or subcutaneous tissue. They are generally asymptomatic; however, they become painful by nervous compression. Since clinical signs...

Bowler's thumb is a rare perineural fibrosis involving the ulnar digital nerve of the thumb. Affected patients present with pain, neuropathy, and mass lesion. The condition is caused by chronic repetitive impaction of the ulnar soft tissues of the thumb against the thumbhole of a bowling ball. In our case, MRI showed decreased signal intensity on both T1- and T2-weighted images surrounding an e...

By using the D2-40 antibody, we have observed podoplanin expression in Schwann cells and perineurial cells. Podoplanin expression has not been well characterized in peripheral nerve sheath tumors. Because neoplasms of neural crest lineage, including peripheral nerve sheath and melanocytic neoplasms, may share histologic and immunohistochemical characteristics, we evaluated podoplanin and S-100 ...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Acute unilateral optic neuritis is associated with a thickening of the retrobulbar portion of the optic nerve as revealed by transorbital sonography, but no comparison has been made between nerve sheath diameter and optic nerve diameter in patients with acute optic neuritis versus healthy controls. We evaluated optic nerve sheath diameter and optic nerve diameter in patie...

Unusual tissue elements may be encountered occasionally in malignant nerve sheath tumors. For instance, cartilaginous differentiation is seen in 11 %, the foci of rhabdomyosarcoma in 15%, and areas showing bone formation may be seen in 4% of these tumors (Warner et a/., 1983). Rarely is more than one type of heterologous element discovered in the same tumor (Agostino et a/., 1963). Besides the ...

PURPOSE To investigate the potential of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) parameters as in-vivo biomarkers of axon and myelin sheath integrity of the median nerve in the carpal tunnel as validated by correlation with electrophysiology. METHODS MRI examinations at 3T including DTI were conducted on wrists in 30 healthy subjects. After manual segmentation of the median nerve quantitative analysis ...

INTRODUCTION Malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors (MPNSTs) are sarcomas which originate from peripheral nerves or from cells associated with the nerve sheath, such as Schwann cells, perineural cells, or fibroblasts. Because MPNSTs can arise from multiple cell types, the overall appearance can vary greatly from one case to the next. This can make diagnosis and classification somewhat difficu...