Aggressive Infantile Embryonal Tumors

Embryonal tumors are the most common brain tumors in infants less than 36 months of age. Histologically characterized as undifferentiated small round cell tumors with divergent patterns of differentiation, these include medulloblastoma, the most common form of embryonal tumor, as well as supratentorial primitive neuroectodermal tumor, medulloepithelioma, ependymoblastoma, medullomyoblastoma, melanotic medulloblastoma, and atypical teratoid/rhabdoid tumor. All are similarly aggressive and have a tendency to disseminate throughout the central nervous system. Because of efforts to avoid craniospinal irradiation in an attempt to lessen treatment-related neurotoxicity, management of these tumors in infants is unique. Outcomes remain similarly poor among all the tumor types and, therefore, identification of specific molecular targets that have prognostic and therapeutic implications is crucial. The molecular and clinical aspects of the three most common aggressive infantile embryonal tumors, medulloblastoma, supratentorial primitive neuroectodermal tumor, and atypical teratoid/rhabdoid tumor, are the focus of this review

Language dominance in partial epilepsy patients identified with an fMRI reading task

Background: fMRI language tasks readily identify frontal language areas; temporal activation has been less consistent. No studies have compared clinical visual judgment to quantitative region of interest (ROI) analysis. Objective: To identify temporal language areas in patients with partial epilepsy using a reading paradigm with clinical and ROI interpretation. Methods: Thirty patients with temporal lobe epilepsy, aged 8 to 56 years, had 1.5-T fMRI. Patients silently named an object described by a sentence compared to a visual control. Data were analyzed with ROI analysis from t-maps. Regional asymmetry indices (AI) were calculated ([L-R]/[L+R]) and language dominance defined as >0.20. t-Maps were visually rated by three readers at three t thresholds. Twenty-one patients had intracarotid amobarbital test (IAT). Results: The fMRI reading task provided evidence of language lateralization in 27 of 30 patients with ROI analysis. Twenty-five were left dominant, two right, one bilateral, and two were nondiagnostic; IAT and fMRI agreed in most patients, three had partial agreement, none overtly disagreed. Interrater agreement ranged between 0.77 to 0.82 (Cramer V; p < 0.0001); agreement between visual and ROI reading with IAT was 0.71 to 0.77 (Cramer V; p < 0.0001). Viewing data at lower thresholds added interpretation to 12 patients on visual analysis and 8 with ROI analysis. Conclusions: An fMRI reading paradigm can identify language dominance in frontal and temporal areas. Clinical visual interpretation is comparable to quantitative ROI analysis