Objective:

In this study, we retrospectively analyzed 40 patients who underwent laryngectomy to treat laryngeal carcinomas at our clinic in terms of cancer epidemiology, preoperative indications, treatments, complications, histopathology, prognosis, and survival and we compared our data with those in the literature.

Material and Methods:

Between 2000 and 2005, 40 patients with laryngeal carcinoma were included in our study.

Results:

All 40 cases were males (100%) and their average age was 55.85 years. The mean duration of disease at the time of the first visit to our clinic was 5.05 months. The most common symptom was dysphonia (95%). The tumor was supraglottic in 20 cases (50%), glottic in 7 cases (17.5%), and transglottic in 13 cases (32.5%). The most common surgical treatment was total laryngectomy with neck dissection (72.5% of patients), the most common early complication was a salivary fistula (5 patients; 12.5%), and the most common late complication stomal stenosis (3 patients, 7.5%). On postoperative histopathological evaluation, squamous cell carcinoma was detected in 39 cases and verrucous carcinoma was detected in 1 case. Also, a postoperative histopathological evaluation showed that 3 of the cases were of stage 1, 9 of the cases (22.5%) were of stage 2, 13 of the cases (32.5%) were of stage 3, and 15 of the cases (37.5%) were of stage 4. The postoperative histopathological grades were grade 1 in 13 patients (32.5%), grade 2 in 24 patients (60%), and grade 3 in 2 patients (5%). Metastatic lymph nodes were histopathologically evident in 8 of the 20 supraglottic cases (40%), in 4 of the 13 transglottic cases (30.8%), and in 2 of the 7 glottic cases (28.6%). Metastatic lymph nodes were found in 4 of 30 clinically staged N0 patients (13.33%). The 1-year, 3-year, and 5-year survival rates of all cases were 97.5%, 92.3%, and 70.5%, respectively.

Conclusion:

In our country, total laryngectomy remains the principal surgical choice because many patients are of low socioeconomic status and visit doctors only late in disease progression.

Keywords: laryngeal cancer, epidemiology, surgery, treatment outcome