Accuracy of cytologic diagnosis of central nervous system tumours in crush preparation

The aim of this study was to assess the usefulness and accuracy of cytologic smears by making crush preparation as a diagnostic method, in central nervous system tumors. 278 patients with central nervous system tumors were investigated. In 98 cases, material was obtained intraoperatively during craniotomy and in 180 cases stereotactic biopsies were done. In all the cases crush preparations were made, and cytologic diagnosis was correlated with final histologic diagnosis. 244 out of 278 patients showed correlation with histopathological diagnosis. So, in present study diagnostic accuracy was 87.76%. In 18 cases no definite diagnosis was made due to inadequate material. Majority of the patients were in age group 31 to 40 years (72 cases). The youngest patient was three years old and the eldest was 87 years old. The most common tumor in intracranial cavity was astrocytoma (56.68%), followed by meningioma (6.88%), medulloblastoma (5.66%) and ependymoma (5.56%). The most common tumor in intraspinal cavity was ependymoma (38.46%), followed by meningioma (23.07%) and schwannoma (23.07%). In conclusion, crush preparation is an effective, simple, rapid, relatively safe and reliable technique for the diagnosis of central nervous system tumors. Diagnostic accuracy of cytology with final histopathological report is established with accuracy rate of 87.76%.