Spinal osteoblastoma (prognosis and treatment): 12 cases.

Study aim: A retrospective study of 12 cases of spinal osteoblastoma.Objectives; To identify factors associated with the development ofscoliosis and its manifestation.Summary of background data ; painful scoliosis is a well recognizedsign of osteoblastoma but because of the small number ofprevious reports, the outcome of the tumor in the spine is not wellknown .Patients and Methods; Ten factors were assessed including age,sex, duration of symptoms, site of lesion, Cobbs angle at presentation,chief complain at presentation, neurological involvement, typeof treatment, recurrence of tumor.50% of the patients had scoliosis. All of the lesions were present onthe concave side of the curve. In the thoracic and lumbar localizations,80% had scoliosis, but no scoliosis was seen on cervical andsacral regions.All patients were under 30 years. The mean time to diagnosis at ourcenter was 18/4 months. All of the cervical cases (2 pat.) had deformity(cock robin) and restriction of range of motion. The lesionwas in posterior elements in all of the cases and localized on onlyone side of the spine. The chief complaint was pain in 67%, deformityin 16% and both (pain and deformity) in 17%. Radiologicalexamination was diagnostic in 58% of cases.Conclusions: These findings support the concept that scoliosis issecondary to asymmetric muscle spasm. The most common complaintis pain and then deformity. In the cervical spine deformityand restriction of motion are the chief complaints.Pain spastically in children (under 13 y) is more obvious than deformity.Treatment is curettage which should be as wide as possible.There was no recurrence in our series.