[Angiography in cancer metastasis to the brain]

Cranio- and angiographic examinations of 89 patients with nodular metastases of cancer into the brain, observed at the N.N. Burdenko Institute of Neurosurgery over a period of 1959 through 1973, are analyzed. Consideration was also given to the duration of anamnesis, to the presence of congestive manifestations on the eye fundus and to their intensity. Main angiographic signs characteristic of carcinomas metastases into the brain, viz. the nature of the cerebral vessels displacement, the structure of the tumours vasculature, the sources of the tumours blood supply and the routes of the blood drainage from metastases, etc. are presented. Major differential-diagnostic distinctions among metastatic cancers, gliomas and meningiomas are listed. An analysis of angiograms with due consideration of anamnestic data and clinical symptoms enables it to establish in most case a differential diagnosis as against primary brain tumours.