Meningioma of the parapharyngeal space: a unique extension of intracranial tumor.

A 45-year-old woman with a meningioma growing in the parapharyngeal space is reported. Her initial symptom was a stuffy feeling in the right ear and swelling of the right parapharynx. The parapharyngeal mass was biopsied, and a frozen section diagnosis suggested a paraganglioma. On electron microscopy, however, the tumor cells failed to show secretory granules, and represented a prominent interdigitation of the cytoplasm with occasional desmosomal attachments. Based on these features the tumor was diagnosed as a meningioma. Thereafter a mass lesion in the temporal lobe of the brain was detected by computerized tomography of the brain. The extracranial extension of the meningioma may occur in some occasions, but such cases in which the infiltrative portion in the parapharyngeal space was initially discovered have been rarely reported.