Mandibular tumor
Skull with a super massive mandibular tumor!! Notice the drawing at the upper right corner! This was a unique case of a giant osteosarcoma of the mandible. Osteosarcoma is the second most frequent primary malignant bone tumor and is usually found in long bones with a small fraction of cases occurring in the skull and jaw. The patient presented with swelling in the left lower jaw which wasn’t addressed on time. Mandibular osteosarcomas present with pain, swelling over bone and adjacent soft tissues, bulging and dislocation of tooth, lack of healing and swelling at the site of tooth extraction. The classical osteosarcoma is the most frequent variant, which develops in the medullary region of the bone and can be subdivided in osteoblastic, chondroblastic and fibroblastic histological types, depending upon the extracellular matrix produced by tumor cells. Early detection of the tumor and early resection of the tumor are the keys to survival. The treatment of osteosarcoma consists of radical or conservative surgery which is followed by radiotherapy or chemotherapy.
