Publication

Abstract : Fine needle aspiration (FNA) is used by surgeons as an initial clinical tool to differentiate between benign and malignant tumors of thesalivary glands. The surgical intervention is planned depending on cytology. Not infrequently, this springs some surprises when thehistopathology reports a malignancy.The aim of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of FNA and cytology on salivary neoplasms and its influence on treatment outcome. Aretrospective study was conducted in 120 patients who underwent surgery for FNA-proven salivary neoplasms at our institute. FNA wasfound to have a sensitivity, specificity and diagnostic accuracy of 66%, 97.1% and 70% respectively. FNA has a reliable sensitivity andspecificity. However, limitations were encountered with specific lesions especially some cystic and malignant lesions which resulted inmodification of treatment.