Butterfly sign (choroid plexus)

Last revised by Daniel J Bell on 20 Oct 2017

The butterfly sign refers to the normal appearance of the choroid plexuses on axial imaging of the fetal brain, commonly observed on the antenatal ultrasound. Its absence may suggest holoprosencephaly 1.

In the CNS, the term should not be confused with a butterfly glioma, which is a glioblastoma that crosses the midline via the corpus callosum, observed in a different age group. 

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