Necrotizing sialometaplasia: frequency of histologic misdiagnosis

Necrotizing sialometaplasia is said to mimic carcinoma, both clinically and histologically. A review of approximately 10,000 oral biopsy specimens revealed only three cases of necrotizing sialometaplasia, all of which had been misdiagnosed as other benign entities. While this suggests that necrotizing sialometaplasia represents only 0.03 percent of biopsied oral lesions, it does not deal with the frequency of cases of this condition which heal spontaneously without being biopsied.