Objective: To discuss the necessity of MRI as a routine examination for diagnosis of glomus tumor.
Methods: From Nov. 2013 to July 2014, 7 cases of glomus tumor were treated in our department. All patients had typical clinical symptoms of glomus tumor and received preoperative X-ray and/or MRI examination. The diagnosis was confirmed by postoperative histopathologic examination. All the patients were retrospectively analyzed by reviewing the preoperative examination results and PubMed search results.
Results: 2 cases underwent only X-ray examination before operation with no positive results. 3 cases underwent both X-ray and MRI. No positive finding happened in X-ray, while MRI showed glomus tumor characteristic on T1- and T2-weighted images which demonstreated a more intense signal after injection of gadolinium. The last 2 cases underwent only MRI examination, which revealed positive images of glomus tumor.
Conclusions: MRI plays an important role in diagnosis of glomus tumor and should be adopted as a routine examination.