Maxillofacial osteosarcoma successfully treated with surgery and adjuvant chemotherapy in a child

Maxillofacial osteosarcoma constitutes a minor percentage of all the head and neck tumors. We describe a 10 year-old girl presenting with swelling and pain in left maxillary region and diagnosed as low grade osteosarcoma. The patient was operated and given a chemotherapy protocol consisted of Cisplatin and Doxorubicin. After six courses of chemotherapy the patient was in complete remission and she is well with no evidence of disease for five years. Since high local recurrence rates have been reported in craniofacial osteoarcoma and we know the deleterious side effects of radiation therapy in children, we believe that best management strategy for osteosarcomas in maxillofacial region in children is radical surgical excision and postoperative chemotherapy (Fig. 3, Ref. 11).