Fine-needle aspiration of neural lesions

The cytomorphologic features of 13 neural lesions sampled by fine-needle as piration (FNA) are reviewed. The frequencies at which various architectural features including Verocay bodies, filamentous background and vascular arc ades were present was recorded, along with the frequencies of cytologic fin dings including the presence of spindle cells wavy nuclei, intranuclear inc lusions, fishhook nuclei, nuclear pleomorphism, filamentous cytoplasm, and mitotic figures. Verocay bodies were a rare finding, present in only 1 of 1 1 cases. Vascular arcades were similarly infrequent (1/11 cases). Spindle-s haped cells along with wavy nuclei were the most frequent findings, with fi shhook-shaped nuclei and a filamentous background of high frequency (9/11 c ases). Our study indicates that same of the characteristic features recorde d in the literature are rarefy seen in needle aspiration smears, but featur es such as spindle-shaped cells, wavy and fishhook-shaped nuclei, and a fil amentous background are relatively frequent findings. (C) 1999 Wiley-Liss, Inc.