Öz
Aim: This report aimed to present up-to-date information about early symptoms, intraoral findings and treatment options for salivary gland tumours in children.
Materials-Methods: The key words "salivary gland", "malignancy" and "children" were searched by using the search engines PUBMED AND GOOGLE SCHOLAR. The titles and summaries of the literatures were evaluated, the suitable ones were included and analysed.
Results: In children, the most common benign salivary gland tumour is pleomorphic adenoma and the most common malignant tumour is mucoepidermoid carcinoma. In benign tumours, the symptom could be only swelling, while in malignant ones’ pain and paralysis can be involved. While the parotid gland tumours can cause the facial nerve paralysis, the submandibular and sublingual gland tumours can affect alveolar, lingual and hypoglossal nerves. Treatment of salivary gland neoplasms is the surgical treatment in children same as in adult patients. In addition to surgical removal, postoperative radiotherapy and chemotherapy may be required. Asymmetrical face growth, dental problems, trismus and osteoradionecrosis can be observed after radiation therapy, so radiation therapy option should be carefully evaluated especially in children and adolescents. The prognosis of salivary gland cancers in children and adolescents is quite good. The 5-year and 10-year survival rate differ from 80% to 100%. The recurrence rate is very low.
Conclusions: Although the incidence of salivary gland tumours in children is considerably lower than in adults, it is important that malignant salivary gland tumours are more common in children.