Intracranial malignant cartilaginous tumours. Report of two cases and review of literature

Abstract

We report two cases of basicranial chondrosarcomas. Intracranial chondrosarcomas are particularly rare, amounting to 0.15% of all intracranial tumours. Their most frequent location is the skull base (76.19%), and more precisely the middle cranial fossa, as they arise from the spheno-occipital synchondrosis. Some intracerebral chondrosarcomas have also been reported. We also refer shortly to another kind of malignant cartilaginous neoplasm that was recently identified by Lichtenstein and Bernstein (1959). This is the mesenchymal chondrosarcoma. Fifteen cases of this have been reported.