Rinsho Shinkeigaku (Clinical Neurology)

Brief Clinical Note

A case of malignant fibrous histiocytoma with metastatic brain tumors after tumorgenic embolism

Keiko Imamura, M.D., Kenji Wada, M.D., Kenichi Yasui, M.D., Kazuhiro Nakaso, M.D., Yasuhiro Watanabe, M.D., Hisanori Kowa, M.D. and Kenji Nakashima, M.D.

Department of Neurology, Institute of Neurological Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, Tottori University

A 61-year-old man had been treated for malignant fibrous histiocytoma with the pulmonary and the lymph node metastasis in the department of orthopedics in our hospital. He was admitted to our department because of an acute onset of conscious disturbance and non-fluent aphasia. Diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) showed high signal intensity areas in the bilateral cerebella, thalami and posterior lobes. T2WI did not show any mass effects. Enhanced CT did not reveal any enhanced lesion. He was diagnosed as having cerebral embolism, and his conscious disturbance was improved after medication. Eight weeks later, he presented dysphagia, dysarthria, and ataxia in his extremities. DWI showed multiple lesions of low signal intensity located at the identical place where had showed high signal intensity in the initial DWI. T2WI showed high signal intensity area with mass effect. It was indicated that cerebral metastasis might grow after tumorgenic embolism. This is a rare case that tumor emboluses were developed to the metastatic brain tumors.

(CLINICA NEUROL, 44: 446|449, 2004)
key words: cerebral embolism, tumor embolism, metastatic brain tumor, malignant fibrous histiocytoma, diffusion-weighted imaging

(Received: 16-Jul-03)