Pediatric Spinal Cord Ganglioglioma

  • Etiology: Neoplasm composed of ganglion cells and neoplastic glial elements
  • Imaging MRI:
    — Intramedullary tumor with syrinx above and below
    — Eccentrically positioned in cord with cord expansion
    — T1WI post contrast: Enhancement
  • DDX: Often indistinguishable from astrocytoma but ganglioma is favored over astrocytoma when patient is of young age or tumor is long length or tumor has patchy enhancement
  • Complications:
  • Treatment: Surgical
  • Clinical: Up to 15% of pediatric intramedullary tumors

Radiology Cases of Spinal Cord Ganglioglioma

MRI of ganglioglioma of the spinal cord
Sagittal T1 (above left) and T2 (above middle) MRI of the spine show an intramedullary tumor of the spinal cord extending from T10 to T12 that on sagittal T1 MRI with contrast (above right) shows heterogenous enhancement. Axial T2 MRI (below) better demonstrates the cord expansion caused by the tumor.