Upcoming Events
Log In
Pricing
Free Trial

Synovial Sarcoma

HIDE
PrevNext

0:00

Dr. P here. This is a 34-year-old man who had a mass

0:01

3 00:00:05,010 --> 00:00:08,119 on his foot that was biopsied, and the biopsy came

0:08

back nodular fasciitis, and that is a good lesson.

0:13

And the lesson is, when you have pathology in

0:17

either the bone or soft tissues, you want a bone

0:20

or soft tissue bone pathologist looking at your

0:23

stuff because that was not the correct diagnosis.

0:26

And he presents somewhat later with this mass.

0:29

There's a few characteristics of

0:31

this mass on T2, T1, and contrast

0:34

enhanced T1 with extensive enhancement

0:38

that support the diagnosis

0:40

of an aggressive neoplasm.

0:41

First, the enhancement is intense.

0:43

Even though it's not dynamic,

0:45

it's an equilibrium-phase enhancement.

0:47

There's a lot of enhancement.

0:49

Then you look at the lesion,

0:50

and it is very heterogeneous inside.

0:53

In fact, when you look very carefully

0:55

at it, it's very heavily septated,

0:58

which plays into the differential diagnosis.

1:01

Next, it has incredible disrespect for boundaries.

1:05

It's even disrespecting the skin.

1:08

It's growing into the dermis.

1:09

If you look at the T1-weighted image and the

1:11

contrast-enhanced image, it's crossing into

1:14

the volar or plantar aspect of the foot.

1:19

So that too suggests an aggressive process.

1:24

So, the differential diagnosis here has to

1:26

include a large complex primary soft

1:30

tissue neoplasm, and the one that would

1:32

work the best here is synovial sarcoma.

1:36

Now there is a differential diagnosis.

1:37

You can get

1:38

synovial chondromas, but they are small.

1:41

You can get an extra-articular soft

1:43

tissue osteogenic sarcoma, but they like

1:47

the upper extremities, they like the

1:49

thigh, and they like the buttock region,

1:51

so this is not a good place for that.

1:53

Soft tissue fibrous sarcoma.

1:55

They're not going to be as heterogeneous

1:57

or as bright on the T2-weighted image,

2:00

so the T2-weighted image is very helpful here.

2:03

One lesion that might be tough to

2:05

differentiate from this lesion,

2:07

but doesn't necessarily like the foot,

2:09

is soft tissue hemangiopericytoma.

2:13

Malignant fibrous histiocytoma,

2:15

it doesn't really have a predilection for

2:17

the foot, it really likes the thigh.

2:19

Whereas this lesion, synovial sarcoma,

2:23

which is the answer, likes the knee and the foot,

2:26

and occasionally will occur in the thigh.

2:29

Giant tophus.

2:30

Well, you'd like to see some erosions

2:32

and some signs of gout, but this would be

2:36

the biggest tophus that I've ever seen.

2:38

And tophagous gout doesn't

2:40

enhance like this, so that is out.

2:42

Myositis ossificans can look really ugly and

2:46

really aggressive, but you get the zonule

2:48

phenomenon, where you get enhancement around

2:50

the outside, and then progressively over time,

2:54

the enhancement may encroach into the center.

2:57

So that's out as well.

2:59

And then you have tumoral calcinosis,

3:02

where you have calcification in the center and

3:04

a bursa-like structure around the outside.

3:07

And on laboratory evaluation, you have

3:09

an abnormal calcium phosphorus product.

3:12

Sometimes they have renal insufficiency.

3:14

So this is synovial sarcoma.

3:16

Now you hear the word synovium.

3:18

There is a benign synovioma of

3:22

the knee joint or of the joint.

3:24

That is not the same lesion.

3:25

It is non-aggressive,

3:27

it is benign, and they're extremely rare.

3:29

These lesions tend to occur in the soft tissues.

3:33

They like to be near tendons,

3:35

tendon sheaths, bursa, less commonly fascia,

3:38

and aponeuroses and the interosseous membrane.

3:41

Again, they're extra-articular,

3:43

which belies their name.

3:45

And, as said, they have a predilection

3:47

for the knee and the foot.

3:48

The average age is about 35 years of age,

3:51

and they tend to calcify about 25% of the time.

3:55

Now, when they calcify heavily,

3:57

they have a better prognosis.

4:00

But for the most part, this lesion

4:01

does not have a great prognosis.

4:03

It does metastasize to the lung.

4:05

And even the lung lesions may calcify.

4:08

Despite its large size, one weird

4:10

aspect about this lesion is it doesn't

4:13

really eat away at bone very much.

4:16

Now because it's composed of epithelium and

4:19

fibrous septa, you get this glandular-like

4:22

appearance with this heavy septation, although

4:25

it's not the organized, brain-like, collagenous,

4:30

parallel septations that you see with very

4:33

aggressive, large, giant, desmoid-like lesions,

4:36

including plantar fibromatosis, which is something

4:40

that occurs in the plantar fascia most commonly.

4:44

About 90% of these have

4:46

translocation of chromosome X to 18.

4:49

And it is believed that these arise from

4:53

pluripotential stem cells from the limb bud.

4:56

There are a few types of these,

4:58

and these include the biphasic type, in which

5:01

you have fibrous and glandular tissue.

5:03

That's this type right here.

5:05

Then monophasic, where either

5:07

fibrous or glandular tissue dominate.

5:09

Those are much less common.

5:11

You have the poorly differentiated type which

5:13

very difficult to differentiate from any other

5:15

poorly differentiated sarcoma other than location.

5:19

You have pure glandular types and then

5:21

you have the heavily calcified type

5:23

which has a pretty good prognosis.

5:26

There is some histologic similarity

5:29

to hemangiopericytoma which can

5:31

make this diagnosis very difficult.

5:33

So, we have some 3D images here that we acquired

5:37

to map out this lesion for potential resection.

5:40

Here is the short axis, the sagittal

5:42

long axis, and the coronal long axis.

5:47

And the lesion has this

5:49

necrotic-looking center to it.

5:52

And you can see its intimate

5:53

contact with the adjacent bone.

5:55

Then we reconstructed it sagittally.

5:57

We reconstructed it in the axial projection.

6:00

It's a nasty lesion.

6:02

It's extra-articular, it likes the foot,

6:04

it likes the knee, it has septations

6:07

and glandular components to it.

6:09

It is the synovial sarcoma.

6:12

Dr. P out.

Report

Faculty

Stephen J Pomeranz, MD

Chief Medical Officer, ProScan Imaging. Founder, MRI Online

ProScan Imaging

Tags

Oncologic Imaging

Neoplastic

Musculoskeletal (MSK)

MSK

MRI

Foot & Ankle

Bone & Soft Tissues

© 2024 Medality. All Rights Reserved.

Contact UsTerms of UsePrivacy Policy