Infectious diseases of the brain: imaging and differential diagnosis

Infectious diseases of the central nervous system have to be considered in differential diagnosis particularly in immunocompromised persons. Neuro-imaging, specifically advanced techniques such as diffusion weighted MRI and perfusion MRI contribute much to the differentiation of brain infections and for differentiating brain infections from other, for instance, neoplastic diseases. In this review we present the imaging criteria of the most important brains infections in adults and in pediatric patients and discuss differential diagnostic aspects in detail. (orig.)