Meningioma size. Its relationship to other diseases.

In an autopsy study of 7.345 cases from a 20-year period, 76 cases of meningiomas were noted. Meningiomas in the diameter range of 0.5 to 2.7 cm ("small" meningiomas) were significantly associated with extraneural malignancies and chronic renal failure as opposed to those in the diameter range of 2.8 to 10.5 cm ("large" meningiomas). These data suggest that small meningiomas may be nosologically distinct from large meningiomas. When discovered at autopsy, small meningiomas may not be "incidental" in the sense of being do novo phenomena of chance occurrence.