Primary yolk sac tumor in the spinal cord

A case of a primary yolk sac tumor of the spinal cord is reported. The patient was a 17-month-old Japanese girl, who was found to have an intramedullary mass at the upper thoracic level. The preoperative diagnosis was primary glioma, but histological examination of the surgical specimen revealed a yolk sac tumor. As there were no other lesions, the spinal cord lesion was considered to be the primary tumor. Based on our previous experience, we treated this patient with low-dose irradiation followed by combination chemotherapy with cisplatin, vinblastine and bleomycin. However, the effectiveness of this therapy was poor in this particular case, and the patient died of pyelonephritis with uncontrollable imbalance of serum electrolytes.