A rare cause of lateral facial swelling

A case of chronic, recurrent and asymptomatic facial swelling in a young male is presented. Swelling extended from lower midface to upper lateral neck and right commissure to anterior massetric border. History, clinical signs and symptoms and examination pointed towards the benign nature of the swelling. Fine-needle aspiration cytology tapered the diagnostic possibilities to a salivary cyst or pseudocyst. Ultrasonography identified the lesion to contain echogenic fluid with irregular borders. "Tail sign" was absent on contrast magnetic resonance imaging, excluding the involvement of the sublingual gland. Surgical excision of the lesion was done along with submandibular gland as both were in continuity via a bottle-neck tract. Final histopathological diagnosis was that of the submandibular gland extravasation phenomenon. As per the best of our knowledge, it is the first case report of a submandibular gland extravasation causing swelling in a retrograde direction onto the face.