[Frequency and differentiation of odontogenic tumors]

The odontogenic tumors stand for a group of lesions of a most interesting and fascinating kind. They represent mirror images of an uncontrolled odontogenesis. The insurmountable problems of insufficient knowledge of etiology, its exceptional rarity and diversity, as well as the lack of a generally accepted nomenclature and classification, defeat almost every attempt to gather and estimate clinical data of the various tumor forms. Considering these problems, various diagnostical criteria to deliminate each single tumor form have been valued and tabulated by means of statistical data, taken from world literature. Easily comprehensible clinical diagnosis, such as sex, age, location, and "characteristic" x-ray results have been valued and tabulated. From the variety of these most different classifications, being mentioned in a short historical survey, the "Histological Typing of Odontogenic Tumours, Jaw Cysts, and Allied Lesions", published by the WHO in 1971, has been chosen and taken as a basis. In addition to this rarely publicised data concerning the absolute and the relative frequency of these tumors have been compiled.