[Our surgical approach to parotid masses: an analysis of 130 patients].

OBJECTIVES

This study aims to evaluate the surgical procedures applied, histopathologic results, incidence of the disease, and complications in patients with parotid tumors.

PATIENTS AND

METHODS

Between January 2002 and December 2010, medical records of 130 patients (63 males, 67 females, mean age 47.2 years; range 15 to 81 years) with parotid masses who were admitted to our clinic and underwent parotidectomy were retrospectively analyzed. Age, sex, surgical procedures applied, histopathological results and complications were recorded.

RESULTS

A total of 105 masses (79.5%) were superficial lobe, while 27 (20.5%) were located in the deep lobe. Two patients were operated twice due to bilateral lesion at different time. We found that 15.2% of patients had nonneoplastic lesions, 67.4% had benign tumors and 17.4% had malignant tumors. The most frequent benign tumor was pleomorphic adenoma. Among malignant tumors, mucoepidermoid carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma and lymphoma were found at same frequency. Superficial parotidectomy was performed on 110 patients, whereas 13 patients underwent total parotidectomy and nine patients underwent total parotidectomy plus neck dissection. Fifteen patients (11.4%) developed facial paralysis during the postoperative period.

CONCLUSION

Our study results suggest that the distribution of patient age-sex, tumor location, pathologic diagnosis, and postoperative complication rate is consistent with the literature.