[Neuroimaging of cerebral vasculitis]

Cerebral vasculitis can have a variety of origins. Furthermore, there are no vasculitis-specific symptoms or imaging signs and vasculitis of the CNS can mimic many other neurological diseases, which require different treatment approaches. Thus, the clinical and radiological diagnosis of cerebral vasculitis is challenging. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and MR angiography (MRA) should be the radiological imaging methods of choice to assess the degree of parenchymal damage and to detect vessel wall changes. If the results are unclear digital subtraction angiography (DSA) should be pursued in order to also detect changes in medium sized vessels. Vasculitis of small vessels cannot be detected by vascular imaging and requires brain or leptomeningeal biopsy. In this review we present the current diagnostic approach and a variety of imaging findings in cerebral vasculitis and discuss the main radiological differential diagnoses.