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CASE REPORT article

Front. Med.

Sec. Infectious Diseases: Pathogenesis and Therapy

Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmed.2025.1600412

Case Report: The Great Mimicker: Cerebral Syphilitic Gumma

Provisionally accepted
Jiahui  LiuJiahui LiuKun  SunKun SunLianshu  DingLianshu Ding*
  • The Affiliated Huaian NO.1 People's Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Cerebral syphilitic gumma, a rare form of neurosyphilis, poses significant diagnostic challenges due to its imaging similarities to gliomas and brain metastases. This report details the diagnostic and therapeutic journey of a patient with cerebral syphilitic gumma admitted to the Department of Neurosurgery, Nanjing Medical University Affiliated Huaian First Hospital in February 2025. Initially misdiagnosed with a brain malignancy, the accurate diagnosis was established intraoperatively and confirmed postoperatively through histopathological examination. This case highlights the importance of considering neurosyphilis in differential diagnoses of intracranial lesions, especially when conventional imaging and clinical presentations are inconclusive.

Keywords: cerebral syphilitic gumma, Neurosyphilis, Cerebral syphilis, case report, Neurosurgery, infectious disease

Received: 26 Mar 2025; Accepted: 09 Jun 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Liu, Sun and Ding. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Lianshu Ding, The Affiliated Huaian NO.1 People's Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, China

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