The cytopathology of reactions to ventricular shunts.

Abstract

A common cause of malfunctioning ventricular shunts is the occlusion of either tip by a variety of normal or reactive tissues and foreign substances. A six-year-old girl with communicating hydrocephalus and a meningomyelocele, a 48-year-old man with an ependymoma and an 11-year-old boy with a pineal germinoma had multinucleated histiocytic giant cells and ependymal cells in cerebrospinal fluid obtained from their ventricular shunts. These cellular changes were interpreted as the cytologic counterpart of the foreign-body inflammatory reactions often seen histologically on occluded shunt tips. Numerous clusters of benign choroid plexus epithelium were found in an ascitic fluid from a six-year-old girl with an optic nerve glioma and a ventriculoperitoneal shunt. Such embolism of normal tissues must be distinguished from metastases from intracranial neoplasms.

• Authors: S H Bigner, P D Elmore, A L Dee, W W Johnston
• Journal: Acta cytologica (Acta Cytol) 1985 May-Jun Vol. 29 Issue 3 Pg. 391-6 ISSN: 0001-5547 [Print] Switzerland
• PMID: 3890442 (Publication Type: Case Reports, Journal Article, Research Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S.)

Topics

• Astrocytoma (surgery)
• Brain Neoplasms (surgery)
• Cerebrospinal Fluid Shunts (adverse effects)
• Child
• Dysgerminoma (surgery)
• Ependymoma (surgery)
• Female
• Foreign-Body Reaction (pathology)
• Glioma (surgery)
• Humans
• Hydrocephalus (surgery)
• Male
• Middle Aged