Seven patients with spinal epidural abscess were evaluated with MR imaging. T1-weighted images were obtained before and after administration of gadopentetate dimeglumine, and contrast-enhanced images were compared with available T2-weighted images and unenhanced T1-weighted images. In all seven cases, the epidural infection was iso- to hypointense compared with the spinal cord on unenhanced T1-...

Spinal epidural abscess accompanies blood-borne infection, vertebral osteomyelitis, or an overlying cutaneous source of infection. This report documents the development of non-infective epidural abscess where the inflammatory response was induced by the highly irritant contents (keratin and cholesterol) of an underlying epidermoid. This was associated with aseptic meningitis.

BACKGROUND Spinal epidural abscess, although an uncommon disease, often correlates with a high morbidity owing to significant delay in diagnosis. METHODS In a prospective 5-year study, the clinical and magnetic resonance (MR) findings, treatment protocols, microbiology, and neurological outcomes were analyzed for 27 patients with spinal epidural abscess. RESULTS Patients were typically midd...

Gas-containing spinal epidural abscesses are uncommon. Moreover, acute spinal epidural abscesses rarely complicate bacterial meningitis in adults. Here, we report a rare case of a gas-containing cervical epidural abscess accompanying bacterial meningitis. In spite of aggressive fluid and continuous antibiotic therapy after the isolation of Streptococcus anginosus and Streptococcus constellatus ...

BACKGROUND The true incidence of serious neuraxial complications such as epidural hematoma or abscess after postoperative epidural infusions is still uncertain, in part due to inconsistencies in multicenter data collection. METHODS Prospective data were collected over 16 yr from the authors' Acute Pain Service, which is based in a large tertiary teaching institution with a nonobstetric genera...

Spinal epidural abscess is a severe, generally pyogenic, infection of the epidural space of spinal cord or cauda equina. The swelling caused by the abscess leads to compression or vascular disruption of neurological structures that requires urgent surgical decompression to avoid significant permanent disability. We share a rare case of Klebsiella pneumoniae spinal epidural abscess secondary to ...

Extranodal lymphomas constitute 20% to 30% of all non-Hodgkin's lymphomas. The common sites involved are skin, stomach, brain, and small intestine. Epidural localization is a rare site for lymphomas, accounting for 10% of spinal epidural tumors. Lymphomas occurring primarily in the epidural space without other previously detected lymphomatous foci (i.e., primary spinal epidural lymphomas) repre...

Copyright © 2017 Massachusetts Medical Society. Acute compression of the spinal cord is a devastating but treatable disorder. Diseases that cause acute spinal cord compression constitute a special category because they originate in the spinal column and narrow the spinal canal. This review addresses the disorders that account for most instances of acute spinal cord compression: trauma, tumor, e...