Giant Intracranial Tuberculoma Resembling a Brain Tumor: A Diagnostic Challenge

Abstract

Despite being potentially remediable, central nervous system tuberculosis continues to be a major cause of morbidity and mortality in developing countries. Intracranial tuberculoma is one of the many presentations of CNS tuberculosis that can occur as solitary or multiple lesions. When tuberculomas are solitary and extremely large, they may cause increased intracranial pressure, compressive focal neurological deficits, or epileptic seizures mimicking a malignant lesion. Even using magnetic resonance imaging and spectrography, giant tuberculoma and brain tumors could be mistaken for one another, which warrants consideration of an infectious etiology as a diagnostic differential for prompt diagnosis and appropriate treatment plan. This case study demonstrates a 22-year-old woman who presented with headache, nausea and vomiting ,blurring of vision , weakness of the right side of the body, and features of frontal lobe syndrome with no particular clinical features of TB, and underwent craniotomy who had a preoperative diagnosis of brain tumor. Histopathology later revealed it to be a tuberculoma.

J Shaheed Suhrawardy Med Coll 2021; 13(2): 177-182