Central nervous system (CNS) involvement of acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) causes poor prognosis. Our three cases show that CNS can be involved at the first hematological recurrence, but predicting this is difficult. Triple intrathecal treatment and craniospinal irradiation were effective, while arsenic oxide failed to prevent and improve CNS involvement.

BACKGROUND Medulloblastoma and other types of tumors that gain access to the cerebrospinal fluid can spread throughout the craniospinal axis. The purpose of this study was to devise a simple multi-compartment kinetic model using established tumor cell growth and treatment sensitivity parameters to model the complications of this spread as well as the impact of treatment with craniospinal radiot...

BACKGROUND To evaluate the effectivity of fractionated radiotherapy in adolescent and adult patients with pineal parenchymal tumors (PPT). METHODS Between 1982 and 2003, 14 patients with PPTs were treated with fractionated radiotherapy. 4 patients had a pineocytoma (PC), one a PPT with intermediate differentiation (PPTID) and 9 patients a pineoblastoma (PB), 2 of which were recurrences. All p...

OBJECTIVES To determine lumbar spine and total body bone mineral density (BMD) in pediatric patients who have undergone cranial or craniospinal irradiation for posterior fossa tumors, specifically medulloblastoma and ependymoma and to analyze the association between degree of osteopenia and factors that may affect BMD. METHODS Retrospective and prospective data collection included medical rec...