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Pediatric Lumbar Puncture

lumbar puncture diagram

During a lumbar puncture, your child's doctor on the Interventional Radiology team at Children's National Hospital will insert a needle into the lower spine:

  • To obtain cerebrospinal fluid (the fluid that circulates around the brain and spinal cord) to look for infection or cancer cells, or
  • To administer a chemotherapy agent for cancer patients, or
  • To monitor and relieve cerebrospinal fluid pressure for patients with pseudotumor
Departments

Departments

Interventional Radiology

Children’s National interventional radiologists perform a full range of minimally invasive, image-guided procedures to both diagnose and treat disease in infants, children, and adolescents.