Definition:
By definition, medulloblastoma is an extremely malignant primary brain tumor that comes from the cerebellum or posterior fossa of the human brain. It belongs to the family of tumors knows as cranial primitive neuroectodermal tumors or PNET.
Diagnosis:
Diagnosis is done through MRI scanning and histological examination
Treatment:
Treatment begins surgical intervention as well radiation and chemotherapy. The outcome for children less than 3 years old, and for those with CSF, spinal, supratentorial or systemic spreading is not good.
Symptoms and Signs:
Symptoms are manifested from the secondary increased intracranial pressure that occurs when the fourth ventricle is blocked; this manifests from 1 to 5 months prior to diagnosis. The child-patient tends to be listless, has a cycle of vomiting as well as morning headache which may mislead diagnosis as being gastrointestinal in origin. Afterwards,the child develops this stumbling gait, will frequently fall and will develop diplopia, papilledema, and nerve palsy. At this stage there is loss of facial sensory, motor weakness, dizziness and nystagmus.
Causes:
Current medical research has proposed that medulloblastoma may come from cerebellar "stem cells" which have been somehow prevented from proper division and differentiation into into their normal cell types. This is confirmed from observations made from different histologic variants taken from biopsies. A typical Rosette formation as observed from s high as half of all cases is indicative of medulloblastoma. Current advances on Molecular genetics has also revealed loss of genetic information on chromosome 17 and the p53 gene, which could account for the defect.
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