INFANTILE FIBROSARCOMA - RADIOLOGICAL AND CLINICAL-FEATURES

Two cases of infantile fibrosarcoma are described. This rare childhood malignancy of mesodermal origin usually affects the lower limbs, as i t did in both of our cases. Previously, the only treatment option avai lable involved some form of radical and often mutilating surgery. More recently, combination chemotherapy has given good results, with the e ffect that various imaging modalities have become important in assessi ng both the initial extent of disease and the response to treatment. C omputed tomography has the advantage of demonstrating the amount of os seous involvement, but at the expense of a considerable dose of ionizi ng radiation. On the other hand, magnetic resonance imaging, with its multiplanar capacity, gives superior demonstration of breaching of tis sue planes, which has important implications for planning of surgery. However, as in other soft tissue tumours, changes in signal characteri stics with treatment have proved less specific than was originally ant icipated.