Pine Tree (Christmas Tree) Bladder

Charles Ney and John Duff reviewed the cysto-urethrogram findings of the neuogenic bladder, in a 1950 article, ‘because of the great resurgence of interest in the neurogenic bladder as a result of [World War II] injuries.’ One of the findings they discussed was the pine tree shaped bladder, ‘a descriptive term applied to bladders which taper towards the dome, and associated usually with trabeculation and often with cellule formation and sacculation. Such a silhouette gives the entire structure the appearance of a pine tree. This type of bladder can be either hyper- or hypotonic in type. It is for the most part characteristic of neurogenic bladder’ ¹ (Figure 1). Other terms used to describe this appearance of the bladder include pine cone and Christmas tree. Figure 1 Radiograph of contrast-filled ‘pine tree’ bladder (author’s case) https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9781003076568/34c29fd5-5662-4e8f-b58c-badd7fa5d724/content/fig64_1_B.jpg"/>