[Lumbosacral dysraphia and "long spinal cord" of delayed appearance (9 cases)]

Urinary disorders, deformities of the feet, and sensory of trophic disturbances appearing during, or increasing in severity at adolescence, were observed in 9 patients. In seven cases there appeared to be an abnormality of the teguments of the lumbosacral region, and in all cases, as shown by straight radiological examination of a spina bifida of L5 or S1, a sacral dehiscence and wide sacral canal, and a subjacent nervous tissue abnormality was suspected. Radiculography showed the presence of a "long spinal cord" terminating in the sacrum by a tumor mass. Examination of this mass in the seven operated cases demonstrated that the tumor was an intradural lipoma with a wedge-shaped penetration into the end of the medulla, fixing the cord in the sacrococcygial region, in the absence of the filum terminale and cauda equina. The etiology of this "long spinal cord" is discussed, and it appears to be the consequence of a dysraphia, which is also the cause of the lipoma. Mechanical factors appear later and produce neurological signs.