Parapharyngeal Space Tumors: FNAC vs Histopathology

PPS is a rare location for head and neck tumors. Most of the lesions (70-80 %) are benign (3) comprising of salivary gland tumors, neurogenic tumors and paragangliomas. The most common malignant tumour in this region is adenoid cystic carcinoma. Fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) can be an easy, rapid, and effective method of diagnosing these myriad of lesions of a specific anatomic space Material and Methods. The present study was conducted on seven patients mainly presenting with painless mass in the neck. FNAC was done, cytomorphological features were evaluated and then histopathological confirmation was done. ObservationsAll seven lesions were benign. Age ranged from 11-55 years with MF ratio 11. pleomorphic salivary adenoma (28.6 %) showed maximum incidence followed by Neurofibroma (14.3 %), Schwannoma (14.3 %), Paraganglioma (14.3 %), Lipoma (14.3 %), Angiofibroma (14.3 %). Conclusion A wide variety of tumors occur in PPS. Parapharyngeal masses sometimes fail to be detected early due to their location and overlapping symptoms with other common illnesses. FNAC can be extremely useful in diagnosing most of these lesions except a few which need histopathological confirmation.