Paraplegia following surgery for medulloblastoma in the posterior fossa.

Postoperative paraplegia following non-spinal surgical procedures is very rare. We report a rare case of medulloblastoma in which paraplegia occurred after surgery. A 4-year-old boy suffered frequent vomiting and was found to have a tumour in the fourth ventricle associated with obstructive hydrocephalus. The tumour had already disseminated in the upper cervical spinal cord and thoracic cord. After surgical removal of the fourth ventricular tumour in the prone position, the patient developed paraplegia of the lower extremities. The cause of this complication may be the intraoperative patient position, overflexion of the neck, and/or imbalance of the subarachnoid pressure between rostral and caudal thoracic spinal cord by removing cerebrospinal fluid at the operative site. We report a rare complication of paraplegia associated with intracranial surgery.