Case report: Intracranial calcifications in an 11-year-old girl: diagnostic approach

In childhood neurological pathology, the frequency of intracranial calcifications varies according to etiology. In fact, intracranial calcifications can be a worldwide finding in some diseases, in others it is a habitual occurrence, and in some it is only an occasional finding. The discovery of cerebral calcifications in children is a challenge for the pediatric neurologist, raising a number of questions and prompting a search for an underlying cause. Calcifications of the basal ganglia represent a distinct radiological entity. When described comprehensively and contextualized within the clinical framework, these calcifications permit the identification of etiologies that range from genetic origins to secondary causes. The aim of this article is to emphasize the importance of a well-established reasoning process that takes into account the age of calcification discovery, the clinical context, the physical examination, and the scannographic characteristics of the calcifications in developing a diagnosis. Here we describe a case of basal ganglia calcifications in a 11-year-old girl, in order to suggest a diagnostic approach to this type of calcification in children.