Fetal craniopharyngioma: early prenatal diagnosis.

Abstract

etal tumors are very rare and have an extremely poor prognosis, particularly when diagnosed in early gestation.Tumors of the brain are especially devastating in the fetus because of their rapid growth and destruction of surrounding tissue.Current high-resolution sonography facilitates early detection of fetal tumors, including details about location, anatomic relationships, and vascularity, and therefore results in a more accurate diagnosis.We report a case of fetal brain craniopharyngioma detected at 20 weeks' gestation by twodimensional and power Doppler sonography.To our knowledge, this is the earliest prenatal diagnosis reported of this rare fetal tumor.