title: Incidence and predictors of malignancy in children with persistent cervical lymphadenopathy.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The aim of this study was to analyze the clinical and histopathologic aspects of persistent cervical lymphadenopathies in children.
  
  
  METHODS
  This retrospective study included 98 children who underwent surgical excision for persistently swollen cervical lymph nodes between 2001 and 2013. Lymph nodes greater than 1.5 cm that persisted for more than 4 weeks and were unresponsive to an initial antibiotic treatment were considered "persistent". The largest lymph node with an abnormal ultrasonographic appearance was selected for surgical biopsy. The patients were divided into 2 groups according to the histopathologic outcome: benign or malignant.
  
  
  RESULTS
  No significant differences were found between the groups regarding the mean size and mean duration of the swollen cervical lymph nodes (p = 0.147 and p = 0.446, respectively). The area under the ROC curve was 0.567 (95% confidence interval = 0.463-0.667, p = 0.259) for lymph node size and 0.507 (95% confidence interval = 0.404-0.609, p = 0.909) for the duration of the cervical lymphadenopathy. There was no significant difference in the presence of B symptoms between the two groups (p = 0.519). No significant difference was found between benign and malignant groups regarding bilaterality (p=0.913).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The findings of our study demonstrated that the size and duration of cervical lymphadenopathy, bilateral or unilateral involvement and the presence or absence of B symptoms are not indicators of malignancy. We found a high incidence of malignancy in pediatric cervical lymphadenopathy cases in contrast to other current studies.
authors.affiliation: Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Gaziantep University Faculty of Medicine, Turkey. Electronic address: facelenk@yahoo.com.
authors.forename: Fatih
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Celenk
authors.forename: Elif
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Baysal
authors.forename: Ismail
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Aytac
authors.forename: Cengiz
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Durucu
authors.forename: Ibrahim
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Sari
authors.forename: Semih
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mumbuc
authors.forename: Muzaffer
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kanlikama
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D017677:Age Distribution; D001707:Biopsy, Needle; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D002908:Chronic Disease; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D015994:Incidence; D008197:Lymph Node Excision / Q000379:methods; D008198:Lymph Nodes / Q000473:pathology* / Q000601:surgery; D008206:Lymphatic Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology; D008297:Male; D009333:Neck; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D012372:ROC Curve; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D018570:Risk Assessment; D017678:Sex Distribution; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric
keywords: B symptoms; Bilaterality; Cervical lymphadenopathy; Duration; Size