Intramedullary Spinal Tumors in Children

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Oncology of CNS Tumors
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Abstract

Pediatric intramedullary spinal tumors (IMSTs) are generally uncommon, comprising 4–6% of all central nervous system (CNS) tumors and 35–40% of all intraspinal tumors in children [13, 21]. Of these, most are of glial origin. Astrocytomas are typically the most common, the majority being fibrillary. In children, the second most common IMSTs are gangliomas followed by ependymomas [13]. Ependymomas become more prevalent in older patients. Many other histological varieties, including germ cell tumors, primitive neu-roectodermal tumors, and intramedullary schwanno-mas, have also been identified in the spinal cord [10, 19]. Hemangioblastomas, typically found in patients with von-Hippel–Lindau disease, are exceedingly rare in the spinal cord in children and account for about 2% of all spinal cord tumors [3].

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Correspondence to John S. Myseros .

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Myseros, J.S. (2010). Intramedullary Spinal Tumors in Children. In: Tonn, JC., Westphal, M., Rutka, J.T. (eds) Oncology of CNS Tumors. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-02874-8_52

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-02874-8_52

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-02873-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-02874-8

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