Mesopharyngeal lymphoepithelioma

Abstract

Introduction: Lymphoepithelial carcinoma is a rare neoplasm and it represents less than 1% of malignant head and neck tumors.

Objectives: To describe a clinical case with diagnosis of mesopharyngeal lymphoepithelioma.

Clinical case: We report a case of a 56-year-old woman, with no medical-surgical history of interest, who attends the consultation for laterocervical tumor and odynophagia, associated with gangosa voice and otalgia of 2 months of evolution. Physical examination revealed a tumor in the left tonsil with an exophytic appearance that extended towards the ipsilateral anterior pillar with a hardened consistency and friable to the touch. A punch biopsy of the left tonsil was performed, which revealed undifferentiated lymphoepithelial carcinoma of the tonsil.

Conclusions: Although fine needle aspiration puncture is a useful technique for the study of cervical masses, it has limitations since its interpretation can be difficult due to the low cellularity of the aspirate at times, for which punch biopsy is recommended of palatal tonsil or more, currently tonsillectomy has been protocolized as mapping, because tumor cells can be found in the depth of the crypts, without causing alterations in their surface that allow suspicion of the disease.

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