Primary Ewing's sarcoma of the skull.

Ewing's sarcoma, a highly malignant bone tumour, typically affects the pelvis and the long bones of the lower extremities in children and young adults and primary involvement of the skull is rare. Here, we present a case of primary Ewing's sarcoma of the skull with localised swelling in a young adult that involved the frontoparietal region of the skull and was very aggressive in nature. Even with aggressive surgery, the patient had multiple recurrences within 1 month of surgery and ultimately the patient died.

Contiguous haemangioblastomas of the brain and spine in a patient of Von Hippel-Lindau disease.

Von Hippel-Lindau (VHL) disease is an inherited, autosomal-dominant syndrome caused by heterozygous germline mutations in the VHL gene, and predisposing to the development of benign and malignant tumours and cysts in multiple organ systems involving eyes, kidneys, pancreas, liver and central nervous system. The responsible tumour suppressor gene for VHL disease is in chromosome 3p25. We are presenting a case of a patient with both cerebellar as well as spinal haemangioblastoma in addition to polycystic pancreas. We operated on both the spinal and the cerebellar haemangioblastomas and the patient had made a very good recovery. We present this case for its rarity along with the literature review.

Spinal extradural cavernous haemangioma in an elderly man.

Cavernous haemangiomas are vascular malformations that may affect any part of the central nervous system. Epidural haemangiomas are rare and constitute ~4% of all epidural tumours and 12% of all intraspinal haemangiomas. These tumours enlarge slowly and produce symptoms of progressive myelopathy or radiculopathy or both. History, clinical examination, routine radiographs, MRI and histopathological studies are the aids for a definitive diagnosis. Surgery can give a very beneficial result with good functional and neurological improvement. Chance of recurrence is less after a good surgical removal. Here we present a case of spinal extradural cavernous haemangioma in a 65- year-old man who had a good functional and neurological recovery after surgery. At 9 months postoperative follow-up, he did well without any new problems with regard to recurrence. We report this case for its rarity.

Solitary osteochondroma of the atlas causing spinal cord compression: a case report and literature review.

Solitary osteochondroma (SOC) of the spine is very rare, though OC is the commonest benign tumour of the bone. Only about 1-4% of SOCs occur in the spine. And solitary ostechondroma of spine causing cord compression is even rarer. These tumours slowly enlarge, creating insidious but progressive symptoms of myelopathy or radiculopathy or both. Clinical histories, routine radiographs, CT studies, MRI studies and histopathological studies are the adjuncts for a definitive diagnosis. Surgical intervention can lead to functional and neurologic improvement with very little chance of recurrence. The authors present a case of a C1 posterior arch intraspinal SOC with cord compression who recovered very well after surgery and was doing well without recurrence after 1 year of surgery. The authors are reporting this case with English language medical literature review as it is quite rare among the SOCs of the cervical spine.