Supra and infratentorial ectopic schwannoma mimicking a meningioma

Abstract

We report the case of a supra and infratentorial ectopic schwannoma, mimicking a meningioma, that was surgically resected on a 75-year-old man, with a history of progressive visual loss and headaches. MRI was in favour of an occipital, cystic, tentorial-based meningioma extending to the posterior fossa, with signs of intratumoral haemorrhage. This is a unique case because of the rare type of lesion, in a very atypical location, completely unexpected by the preoperative imaging analysis, and to the best of our knowledge it is the oldest patient reported in the literature with this kind of tumour.

Tentorial ectopic schwannoma: A case report and literature review

“…Intracranial schwannoma not related to cranial nerves is called "intracranial ectopic schwannomas" (IES) and represents less than 1% of intracranial schwannoma [5] . Among them, dural-based IES, especially TES, is extremely rare.…”

“…Since the first case was reported by Flickinger et al. in 1988 [6] , we collated only 18 patients with TES all over the world, including this case ( Table 1 ) [1 , [5] , [6] , [7] , [8] , [9] , [10] , [11] , [12] , [13] , [14] , [15] , [16] , [17] , [18] , [19] , [20] . It is popular to occur in children and young adults, and no significant differences are found between genders [5] .…”

Intracerebral schwannoma in a pediatric patient with schwannomatosis: A case report and literature review

“…Schwannomas are nerve sheath tumors, which comprise around 5%-8% of primary intracranial neoplasms. 3 Around 80%-90% of theses schwannomas are seen in association with the eighth cranial nerve and noted at the cerebellopontine angle. 3 Less than 1% of schwannomas are intracerebral and unrelated to cranial nerves, with only 150 cases reported in literature thus far; leading to a lot of speculation on the histogenesis of these rare tumors.…”

“…3 Around 80%-90% of theses schwannomas are seen in association with the eighth cranial nerve and noted at the cerebellopontine angle. 3 Less than 1% of schwannomas are intracerebral and unrelated to cranial nerves, with only 150 cases reported in literature thus far; leading to a lot of speculation on the histogenesis of these rare tumors. 4 Various theories have been proposed to explain the origin of intracerebral schwannomas.…”