title: Clival chordoma presenting with acute brain stem hemorrhage.
abstract: The authors present a case of a 29-year-old man who developed rapidly progressive cranial nerve palsies and a right hemiparesis secondary to a pontine hemorrhage. The rare but correct diagnosis of a clival chordoma which had invaded the brain stem and subsequently hemorrhaged was based on computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging. The diagnosis was confirmed at surgery when the patient underwent a successful operative decompression of tumor and clot from the pons via a sub-occipital craniotomy. This represents the first case of a clival chordoma to hemorrhage into the brain stem, which was diagnosed preoperatively and the patient survived.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neuroradiology, Toronto Hospital, University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: A D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Levi
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Kucharczyk
authors.forename: A P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Lang
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Schutz
mesh_terms: D000208:Acute Disease; D000328:Adult; D001932:Brain Neoplasms / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000473:pathology; D001933:Brain Stem / Q000473:pathology; D002543:Cerebral Hemorrhage / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology*; D002817:Chordoma / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000473:pathology; D003388:Cranial Fossa, Posterior; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed