title: Spinal cord compression due to undiagnosed thoracic meningioma following lumbar surgery in an elderly patient: a case report.
abstract: As spinal surgery in elderly patients is becoming increasingly frequent, comorbidities likely to be decompensated after such procedures must be kept in mind. We report here the case of an 82-year-old woman who presented rapidly progressive spinal cord compression following lumbar surgery for radiculopathy. Investigations showed a thoracic intradural extramedullary compressive lesion, which after removal turned out to be a meningioma. We suggest that radiculopathy and non-specific degenerative modifications partially masked this lesion, and that lumbar surgery caused this acute neurological deterioration. Therefore, we advice caution in older patients among whom such ambiguous clinical presentation is frequent.
authors.affiliation: Service de neurochirurgie, hôpital Bicêtre, 78, rue du Général-Leclerc, 94270 Le Kremlin-Bicêtre, France; Association des Jeunes Chirurgiens du Rachis (AJCR), 237, rue de Bercy, 75012 Paris, France. Electronic address: stevenknafo@gmail.com.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Knafo
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Lonjon
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Vassal
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Bouyer
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Lonjon
mesh_terms: D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D017586:Diskectomy; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008577:Meningeal Neoplasms / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis; D008579:Meningioma / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis; D055013:Osteoarthritis, Spine / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D013117:Spinal Cord Compression / Q000209:etiology*; D013120:Spinal Cord Neoplasms / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis; D013904:Thoracic Vertebrae; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed
keywords: Elderly; Meningioma; Spinal