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Superficial Siderosis

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Essentials of Cerebellum and Cerebellar Disorders

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Abstract

Superficial siderosis (SS) is an uncommon and often underdiagnosed disorder caused by chronic or repeated hemorrhage in the subarachnoid space that deposits hemosiderin in the subpial layers of the central nervous system, leading to impaired nerve function. The progression of SS is insidious, often requiring patients to experience advanced symptoms until a clinician with a high level of suspicion for the condition orders magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain or spine and diagnoses the condition by confirming the characteristic image findings. Conditions that can cause repeated bleeding episodes into the subarachnoid space are wide-ranging, so the diagnosis of SS in some cases may be the beginning of an arduous journey searching for the ailment that led to SS development. This chapter will review the fundamentals of SS and focus on spinal dural defects, which have recently become a topic of interest as the precipitating condition that brings about SS.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Surgical Science, Tokai University School of Medicine, Isehara, Japan

    Hiroyuki Katoh & Masahiko Watanabe

Authors
  1. Hiroyuki Katoh
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  2. Masahiko Watanabe
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hiroyuki Katoh .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Neuroscience Department, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA, USA

    Donna L. Gruol

  2. Department of Integrative Physiology, Gunma University Graduate School of Medicine, Maebashi, Gunma, Japan

    Noriyuki Koibuchi

  3. Service de Neurologie, CHU-Charleroi, Charleroi, Belgium

    Mario Manto

  4. Clinical Translational Research, Santa Lucia Foundation, Rome, Italy

    Marco Molinari

  5. Ataxia Center, Cognitive Behavioral Neurology Unit, Laboratory for Neuroanatomy and Cerebellar Neurobiology, Department of Neurology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Jeremy D. Schmahmann

  6. Department of Physiology, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzho, China

    Ying Shen

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Katoh, H., Watanabe, M. (2023). Superficial Siderosis. In: Gruol, D.L., Koibuchi, N., Manto, M., Molinari, M., Schmahmann, J.D., Shen, Y. (eds) Essentials of Cerebellum and Cerebellar Disorders. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-15070-8_101

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