Tumors of the cauda equina generally present with lower back pain. They are usually
recognized at a late stage as they grow slowly, the surrounding anatomical environment
is spacious, the symptoms that appear are not specific, and the majority of the affected
patients are young and otherwise healthy. In this paper, we present the diagnosis
and treatment of a young male patient who has undergone the surgical removal of an
ancient schwannoma of the cauda equina. Dur-ing the operation, the tumor was completely
resected, and following that the patient's complaints disappeared. The key point to
an accurate diagnosis of this kind of tumor before the operation was the appropriate
radiological study, i.e., T1-, T2-weighted MRI, and postoperatively the histological
processing of the removed neoplasm. Reviewing the lit-erature, this pathological type
of schwannoma appeared to be extremely rare in the cauda equina: so far, only three
cases have been published internationally, however, we could not find a single paper
in the Hungarian medical literature on this topic.
