Objectives: Examine the management of the clinically negative neck and evaluate the role of elective neck dissection in patients with squamous carcinoma of the floor of the mouth.
Design: Retrospective analysis of a cohort of patients with squamous carcinoma of the floor of the mouth and N0 stage disease of the neck who were treated between 1973 and 1992. The mean follow-up was 6 years.
Patients: The cohort consisted of 129 patients. Excluded from analysis were patients without evidence of disease but less than 3 years of follow-up and those with uncertain resection margins.
Intervention: Resection of the floor of the mouth lesion with or without marginal mandibulectomy. Elective lymphadenectomy was performed in 26 (23%) of the 129 patients.
Outcome measure: Estimates were obtained of survival according to mode of therapy, classification of treatment modality, determinate cure, locoregional failure, salvage, and occult disease by clinical stage.
Results: Occult disease was detected in 23% of the patients who underwent elective neck dissection. Recurrence in the neck occurred in 36% of 103 patients who received follow-up but did not undergo elective neck dissection. The determinate survival at 3 years was 100% for patients with occult disease who underwent elective neck dissection. Overall, 96% of the patients who were treated with elective neck dissection were cured; 85% of the patients who received no initial treatment of the neck were cured; and 59% of the patients with failure in the neck were salvaged.
Conclusions: A more aggressive approach to the neck with N0 disease may be warranted. Selective neck dissection allows early removal of occult metastases with acceptable morbidity. In elective dissection for clinically and histologically negative necks, the high rate of survival may result from the removal of metastatic carcinoma that was missed in the histopathologic sampling process.