Correlation Study of MRI Features and Pathology in Intracerebral Ependymoma

Purpose To study the relationship of MRI features and pathologic types of intracerebral ependymoma.Materials and Methods MRI manifestation of 18 cases of intracerebral ependymoma confirmed by surgery and pathology were retrospectively analyzed.All patients underwent plain and dynamic contrastenhanced MR scan,and the relationship between MRI manifestations and pathologic types were analyzed.Results 10 cases were cystic ependymoma which located at the supratentorium,the cystic regions with low signal intensity on T1WI and high signal intensity on T2WI,and the solid regions with iso-intensity on both T1WI and T2WI.Pathologic types of these 10 cases were ependymomas.Eight cases were solid tumors.Five of them located at the supratentorium with heterogenous signal intensity on both T1 and T2 weighted images which were confirmed to be anaplastic ependymomas.Three cases of infratentorial solid ependymomas represented long T1 signal and were heterogenous on T2WI.Two of them were ependymomas and one was anaplastic ependymoma.After contrast enhanced,15 cases were peripheral enhancement and three were heterogenous enhancement.Conclusion Most of ependymomas with cystic and solid component have characteristic MRI features and are consistent with the pathologic type.