Intramedullary spinal cord tumors: A retrospective multicentric study

Intramedullary tumors are neoformations taking part on the spinal cord, and they are a rare pathology. Due to the rarity of such lesions, clinical studies take years to ensure a decent feedback with a significant number of cases.

Our study is retrospective and descriptive.

We share a Tunisian multicentric experience of 27 years through a retrospective study of 120 cases of spinal cord tumors that have been operated in six different centers.

The clinical, radiological, and histological findings have been analyzed along with postoperative results and tumoral progression so that we could conclude to some factors of prognosis concerning the management of these tumors.

The mean age of our patients is 33.84 years. We had 57 males and 63 females. The most frequent revealing symptom was motor trouble presented as frequent as 77.5% of the patients. Glial tumors were represented in 81 of the cases (67.5%) and nonglial by 39 cases (32.5%). Glial tumors we found were essentially 39 ependymomas and 35 astrocytomas. Surgical resection is key in the management of these lesions; the quality of tumoral resection was a significant factor of disease progression as subtotal resection is correlated to more important progression than total one.

We conclude this work with some statements. In terms of functional results, age is not a significant factor. Presurgical functional state, the histological type, and the extent of surgical resection are the important factors.