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Histologic analysis of pediatric tonsil and adenoid specimens: is it really necessary?
Sunil P Verma1, Timothy Stoddard, Ignacio Gonzalez-Gomez
1Children's Hospital Los Angeles, Division of Pediatric Otolaryngology, 4650 Sunset Blvd M/S #58, Los Angeles, CA 90027, United States. sverma@usc.edu
Objective:
To evaluate the incidence of unexpected histologic findings in routine tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy specimens.
Methods:
A retrospective medical record review was performed at a tertiary care children's hospital. The pathology records of 2062 children who underwent tonsil or adenoid surgery were analyzed and the final histologic diagnosis was recorded.
Results:
Four unexpected histologic findings were found on routine tonsil and adenoid specimens. None were clinically significant. A review of the literature shows a very low rate (0.015%) of unexpected clinically significant diagnoses in pediatric adenotonsillectomy specimens.
Conclusions:
Given rarity of unexpected clinically significant diagnoses in pediatric adenotonsillectomy specimens, the cost and effort of analyzing each specimen histologically is difficult to justify.
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