Retrospective Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2018. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Radiol. Jul 28, 2018; 10(7): 65-77
Published online Jul 28, 2018. doi: 10.4329/wjr.v10.i7.65
Evaluation of pineal cysts with magnetic resonance imaging
Erkan Gokce, Murat Beyhan
Erkan Gokce, Department of Radiology, Gaziosmanpaşa University, School of Medicine, Tokat 60100, Turkey
Murat Beyhan, Department of Radiology, Tokat State Hospital, Tokat 60100, Turkey
Author contributions: Gokce E and Beyhan M collected and analyzed the data equally; Gokce E designed, supervised and some statistical analysis the study; Gokce E and Beyhan M had taken part in literature research and manuscript preparation and had read and approved the final version.
Institutional review board statement: This study was reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee of the Gaziosmanpaşa University School of Medicine (No: 18-KAEK-015).
Informed consent statement: Patients were not required to give informed consent to the study because figures used picture archiving and communication system were studied retrospectively. This study does not contain identifiable information of the participants.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Erkan Gokce, MD, Associate Professor, Department of Radiology, Gaziosmanpaşa University, School of Medicine, Kaleardı Quarter, Muhittin Fisunoglu Street, Tokat 60100, Turkey. erkangokce@mynet.com
Telephone: +90-542-3798986 Fax: +90-362-2309105
Received: March 12, 2018
Peer-review started: March 13, 2018
First decision: April 23, 2018
Revised: April 29, 2018
Accepted: May 23, 2018
Article in press: May 23, 2018
Published online: July 28, 2018
Processing time: 140 Days and 1.2 Hours
Abstract
AIM

To evaluate radiological imaging findings of patients who had been found to have pineal cyst (PC) in brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

METHODS

A total of 9546 patients who had brain MRI examination in March 2010-January 2018 period were studied. Fifty-six patients (44 female and 12 male) found to have PC were evaluated. Eighteen of the patients had had follow-up examinations of 2-94 mo (mean 30.50 ± 28.83). PC dimensions and volume, radiological imaging features (signal intensities, contours, internal septation-loculation and contrast-enhancement features) and natural history in cases who had been followed-up were evaluated by two radiologists.

RESULTS

Of 9546 patients, 5555 were female (58.2%) and 3991 male (41.8%). Age range was 1-99 (mean 43.18 ± 20.94). PC frequency was calculated to be 0.58%. Forty-four of the 56 patients (78.57%) with PC were female and 12 male (21.43%), and their age range was 5-61 (mean 31.26 ± 12.73). Thirty-five of the PCs were typical (62.50%) and 21 (37.50%) were atypical. No significant difference was found between initial and final imaging sizes of PCs which were monitored by follow-up examinations (P > 0.05).

CONCLUSION

PCs are cysts which do not show clear size and natural changes and are more frequently observed in females and in adult ages. Most of them are isointense with cerebrospinal fluid on T1 and T2A weighted images, hyperintense compared to cerebrospinal fluid on fluid-attenuated inversion recovery; sequence and smoothly contoured. Their typical forms have peripheral rim and multilocular ones may have septal contrast-enhancement.

Keywords: Magnetic resonance imaging; Pineal cyst; Pineal region

Core tip: In this retrospective study, brain magnetic resonance images of 9546 patients were studied to detect incidence, size, contour, septation and contrast-enhancement features of pineal cysts (PCs). In addition, size and natural changes in follow-up examinations were also investigated. Classification of PCs based on routine magnetic resonance imaging examinations could change when examination was performed using high resolution sequences due to detection of septations within them. The present study revealed that no significant size or natural change was observed in follow-up examinations of PCs.