Cytodiagnosis of tuberculosis of the skull by fine needle aspiration cytology: a case report.

Close to one-third of the world's population is believed to be infected with tuberculosis, with the vast majority being in the developing world. However, even in the developed world, the incidence of this disease has been steadily increasing. Tuberculosis is very common in the Indian subcontinent, but at the same time tuberculous infection of the skull is rare and very few cases have been reported. We report a child who presented with a swelling of the frontal bone of the skull. Fine needle aspiration yielded the cytological diagnosis of tuberculosis on the basis of a necrotising granulomatous process with acid-fast bacilli detected on Ziehl Neelsen stain. This procedure obviated the need for an operative procedure and the patient responded to anti-tuberculous therapy. As the incidence of tuberculous infection is on the increase, both in the developed and in the developing world, the importance of diagnosis by newer non-invasive techniques like fine needle aspiration cytology cannot be overemphasized. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of its kind in the world literature.