[A case of massive fatal hemorrhage in a recurrent medulloblastoma during radiotherapy]

Abstract

A medulloblastoma in a 7-year-old girl showed complete remission after the initial radiotherapy of 5,000 rad. But she had three episodes of recurrence in the cerebellum and in the spinal cord, and was treated by additional radiotherapy for the lesions 3,000 to 5,000 rad. When the total cerebellar tumor dose became 13,300 rad, a fatal intratumoral hemorrhage occurred. Autopsy revealed a massive intratumoral hematoma and thin-walled tumor vessels which might be designated as "sinusoid" or "telangiectasia" microscopically. The authors proposed a possibility that the thin-walled vessels and the high dose of radiotherapy caused the hemorrhage.