Ultrasound in salivary gland disease

This text reviews the normal ultrasound (US) anatomy of the salivary glands along with tumoral, lithiasic, and inflammatory pathologies. For salivary gland tumors, US does have limitations (failure to visualize the entire parotid gland, relations with the nerve plexus, in-depth spread of large tumors, false-negative errors of malignancy for small encapsulated tumors). However, US is a simple technique allowing correct identification of the benign nature of a lesion in over 80% of the cases. For lesions under 3 cm in diameter, US is generally the only imaging technique used; for larger lesions, CT or MR is required. Sialolithiasis and inflammatory diseases are being documented by US more and more and the indications for sialography have strongly decreased.