[Results of sialography (author's transl)]

A randomly selected group of patients which had been subjected to sialography during 1975/76, was analysed retrospectively. In a total of 386 patients, 395 contrast radiographs had been performed; of these, 243 sialographs were evaluated retrospectively, the definite diagnosis having been established by surgery, biopsy or clinical course of the disease. The accuracy of diagnosis was 95% when employing diagnosis by exclusion (sialographic diagnosis having yielded "normal findings"), the correct diagnosis being the presence of concrements and inflammatory diseases of the salivary gland. However, the rate of error amounting to 5% must be considered a cause for concern insofar as of the total of 8 wrong diagnoses (against a total of 154 correct diagnoses), 7 patients had tumours which had not been recognized, four of these tumours being of a malignant nature. The presence of a space-occupying process was diagnosed with an accuracy of 88%. Space-requiring growths, provided they were properly diagnosed, were correctly localised in 83% of the cases. Statements on the degree of malignancy of a tumour--which were made in about one-third of the tumour diagnoses only--were found to be correct in 83% of the cases. False positive findings were obtained in 12% of the patients.