Differential diagnosis of submandibular gland swellings

What is it about?

Submandibular gland excision for primary lesions has relatively low incidence compared with other surgical implications. Although chronic sialadenitis caused by symptomatic sialolithiasisis the most frequent indication for surgery, diverse clinical entities should be ruled out for differential diagnosis of swellings of this region.

Featured Image

Why is it important?

In the 6-year retrospective study, we analyzed patients undergoing transcervical excision of submandibular gland according to their age, gender, FNAC findings, final specimen reports and surgical complications and discussed our findings with the current literature. Chronic sialadenitis caused by symptomatic sialolithiasiswas the most common indication for gland surgery prevail among males in 4th and 6th decades of life, followed by pleomorphic adenoma of the gland which was prevalent in females starting from the 2nd decade of life. Ultrasonography and FNAC were our two major methods for diagnosis of gland lesions. We performed FNAC before all neoplastic lesions and our FNAC was 86.7%. Our high malignity rate (33.3%) of primary tumors was consistent with current literature. Transient palsy of the marginal mandibular nerve was the main complication of our surgery.

Perspectives