Spinal subarachnoid hemorrhage accompanied with intraventricular hemorrhage

Abstract

• Spinal hematoma is a rare and usually severe neurological disorder that, without adequate treatment, often leads to death or permanent neurological deficit. Epidural as well as subdural and subarachnoid hematomas have been investigated in some studies. A 66-year-old man referred to our hospital because of acute onset paraplegia and incontinency started 3 h before admission. With impression of spinal hemorrhage, emergent cervicothoracic spinal MRI performed. On magnetic resonance imagination (MRI) mixed hyper/iso intense lesion in anterior subarachnoid space from C7 to T5 was seen. On brain A computerised tomography (CT) scan, subarachnoid hemorrhage and intraventricular hemorrhage in posterior parts of brain was seen. Unfortunately, the patient died 10 days later. About our patient, severe back pain accompanying by immediate paraplegia, sphincter disturbances, sensory level, and prominent meningeal signs guided us clinically to spinal subarachnoid hemorrhage. Further brain CT scan revealed diffusion of blood to brain subarachnoid space and ventricles. An outstanding finding on brain CT was the presence of blood only in posterior horn of lateral ventricles and dorsal fissures of brain supporting our theory that blood has diffused from spinal subarachnoid space to dorsal subarachnoid space of brain because of supine position of patient. In this patient anticoagulation may be the only sinister factor for developing complications.
• Key words: Anticoagulants, spinal subarachnoid hemorrhage, spinal subdural hematoma, tomography, X-ray computed