Prevalence of head and neck tumors of children referred to Pathology centers in Kermanshah city (2003-2012)

Background: Neoplasmas are the second agent of mortality in children below 15 years of age. The aim of this study was to investigate head and neck tumor frequency in children aged 15 years or younger.

Methods: This descriptive- retrospective study was conducted on the pediatric’s pathologic records in Archive of Pathology Department, Kermanshah Pediatric Hospitals from 1382 to 1391. The records were rewied regarding gender, age, histopathologic diagnosis, and location of benign and malignant tumors. These datas were statistical analyzed by SPSS 20 software using descriptive statistics.

Results: A total of 196 cases including 98 males and 98 females aged 17 months to 15 years with mean age 9.3±4.3 were evaluated. The subjects composed of 88.3% benign and 11.7% malignant tumors. The most frequent benign tumors were follicular hyperplasia (27.7%), epidermal cyst (12.1%), pyogenic granuloma (10.4%).Of 23 malignant tumors, papillary carcinoma were the most frequent (34.8%) followed by basal cell carcinoma (26.1%), lymphoma (26.1%); and squamous cell  carcinoma (13%). The ratio of males to females was 1:1.06 for benign and 0.65:1 for malignant tumors. The age peak was 11-16 years for incidence of benign (39.3%) as well as malignant (65.2%) tumors. Neck was detected as most common location for occurrence of benign and malignant tumors.

Conclusions: Findings of this study suggest that in children aged up to 15 years, female gender is a predominance factor for occurrence of head and neck cancers; however, incidence of benign tumors is approximatelly similar in males and females.