ABSTRACT
The study domain, salivary gland carcinoma, is marked by a low incidence and a variety of grades of differentiation within a heterogeneous histologic appearance.
Incidence
Tumors of epithelial origin account for 95% of salivary gland malignancies, but nevertheless they remain an infrequent phenomenon1. Annual incidence rates of salivary gland carcinoma range from 4 to 65 new patients per 106
people, with very high incidence rates being reported in Greenland2 and the Canadian Arctic (135 per 106)3. About 10 new patients per 106 persons at risk per year are diagnosed in the United States of America4. The incidence in Western Europe is somewhat lower. For instance, in the Netherlands, the European standardized incidence rate per 106 persons was 6 for men and 5 for women in 19955. The Netherlands’ incidence data are comparable to its neighboring countries (Denmark 1983-87: 6 for men and 5 for women2; Flanders 1997-99: 7 for men, 4 for women6; United Kingdom 7 both for men and women7). In 1995, 89 new salivary gland carcinomas were
diagnosed in a population of 15.5 million (Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute) in the Netherlands. Considered at the different levels of health care, a general practitioner will see one such patient in 50 years of practice, an otorhinolaryngologist one or two patients a year, and about ten new patients will present at a center for Head and Neck Oncology8.
