The Association of Leprosy and Spinal Psammomatous Meningioma: A Case Report

Abstract

Leprosy or Hansen's disease (HS) caused by Mycobacterium leprae may involve all organ systems, especially skin and nervous system, and is an contagious disease. The responsible organism is M. leprae which is an acid-fast staining bacilli and similar to M. tuberculosis. Spinal masses are rarely seen tumoral lesions. Intradural spinal masses are generally extradural located meningiomas, nerve-sheath tumors and metastasis. A 68-year-old female patient followed up by a local leprosy center was admitted for new onset lower extremity motor deficits and urinary incontinence. Cervical MRI showed the mass in size of 3 × 1.5 cm. The case was operated under general anesthesia and the lesion was located in the intradural extramedullary space with smooth border and removed totally. The pathologic result was reported as psammomatous meningioma. The purpose of this study was to present the improvement of paraparesis in the case with rarely seen lepromatous type leprosy and a spinal mass which was histologically psammomatous meningioma after emergent surgical intervention.