Acute formation of lumbar discal cyst: what is the mechanism?

Lumbar discal cysts are extremely rare pathologies, with only few reports describing these lesions in the literature. Moreover, their definite pathogenesis is still unknown, with proposed theories based on radialogic and histologic findings. In this report, the authors present an acute formation of a discal cyst, which is reported for the first time. Also, we center our case on the discussion of the possible pathogenesis. Also, this is the first case of discal cyst reported in Turkey. A 67-year-old woman, whose complaints, and clinical and radiological findings demonstrated lumbar disc herniation with acute Modic 1 degererative changes of the adjacent end plates of L3-4 level. After medical and physical therapies, follow-up lumbar MRI has been taken to demonstrate a discal cyst formation on the adjacent intervertebral disc, showed cranially migrated cyst superior posterior on herniated disc, in 2 weeks period. The patient was treated by microsurgical resection of the cyst, and her complaints resolved completely.