Differentiation of Intraspinal Tuberculosis and Metastatic Cancer Using Magnetic Resonance Imaging

This study aimed to explore the differences in the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) findings between intraspinal tuberculosis and metastatic cancer, which may aid in making the correct diagnosis.

The clinical features and MRI findings of 15 patients with intraspinal tuberculosis and 11 patients with intraspinal metastatic cancers were retrospectively analyzed.

The mean ages of the patients with intraspinal tuberculosis and metastatic cancer were 26.3 (15-42) and 52.1 (38-67) years, respectively. All intraspinal tuberculosis cases were secondary to primary extraspinal tuberculosis, including tuberculous meningitis (11/15), as well as pulmonary (9/15), vertebral (5/15), urinary tract (1/15), abdominal (1/15), cervical lymph node (1/15), and multisystem tuberculosis (9/15). The intraspinal metastases originated from the breast (5/11), lung (3/11), kidney (1/11), ovarian (1/11), and nasopharyngeal cancers (1/11). Both intraspinal tuberculosis and metastatic cancers presented with multiple intra- and extramedullary lesions throughout all regional segments of the spinal canal, accompanied by irregularly thickened meninges. Intraspinal tuberculous lesions had indistinct edges that integrated with each other, most of them exhibiting obvious enhancement on MRI. Conversely, intraspinal metastatic lesions were distinctly separated with clear edges and exhibited lesser enhanced MRI than intraspinal tuberculosis.

A combined analysis of clinical features and MRI findings may be helpful in differentiating intraspinal tuberculosis from metastatic cancer.