Background:

Surgical treatment of clinically negative neck in maxillary squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of the upper jaw is controversial. The purpose of this study was to define the incidence of cervical metastasis and to assess if elective neck dissection is justified when the neck is not primarily affected.

Methods:

We retrospectively reviewed 20 patients treated of SCC of the maxillary alveolus and hard palate between 2005 and 2012.

Results:

Six (30%) patients presented with cervical lymph metastasis at initial diagnosis. Two of the14 patients who initially had no signs of metastasis in the neck developed cervical metastasis during follow-up and another patient with cervical metastasis at diagnosis developed contralateral cervical metastasis. All the patients with cervical metastasis (45%) were pT3/T4 SCC. Cervical metastasis developed at a mean of 11.6 months.

Conclusions:

Despite this study being limited by its retrospective nature and the sample size, based on our findings and on an extensive review of the literature, we may conclude that cervical metastasis from maxillary alveolus and hard palate SCC appears most frequently in pT3/T4 tumors. Therefore, we find elective neck dissection appropriate for patients with pT3/T4 SCC of the upper jaw.

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