Second Primary Tumors in Patients Presenting With Unilateral HPV‐Associated Tonsillar Squamous Cell Carcinoma

xlomafota13 shared this article with you from Inoreader Second Primary Tumors in Patients Presenting With Unilateral HPV‐Associated Tonsillar Squamous Cell Carcinoma Via The Laryngoscope Objective To describe and compare rates of metachronous and synchronous second primaries of the contralateral tonsil in patients with primary HPV(+) tonsillar squamous cell carcinoma (SCC). Study Design Retrospective cohort study. Materials and Methods This is a single tertiary care center retrospective case series, from 2006 to 2019, of HPV(+) tonsillar SCC patients who underwent primary surgical resection with unilateral wide-field tonsillectomy or bilateral tonsillectomy for diagnostic or therapeutic purposes. A metachronous second primary is one diagnosed >6 months after completion of surgical treatment. A synchronous second primary is one diagnosed during bilateral tonsillectomy for unilateral HPV(+) tonsillar SCC. Rates of second primary and patient characteristics were compared using chi-square tests. Results About 303 patients underwent unilateral surgical resection +/− adjuvant therapy for HPV(+) tonsillar SCC. One (0.3%) developed a metachronous second primary in the contralateral tonsil 11.9 years following treatment. Fifty-seven patients with HPV(+) tonsillar SCC underwent bilateral tonsillectomy, and 37/57 (65%) had no clinical signs for contralateral disease. Of these, only 1/37 (2.7%) was incidentally found to have a synchronous second primary. Twenty patients underwent bilateral tonsillectomy due to clinical concern for contralateral disease. Of these, 3/20 (15%) were found to have a synchronous HPV(+) SCC in the contralateral tonsil. Conclusions The prevalence of metachronous second primary after appropriate treatment of HPV(+) tonsillar SCC is very low (0.3%) and so is the chance of incidentally discovering a synchronous second primary during bilateral tonsillectomy (2.7%). We do not recommend bilateral tonsillectomy as a part of the routine algorithm in the surgical management of these patients. Level of Evidence 3 Laryngoscope, 2021 View on the web Inoreader. Take back control of your news feed. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook.