Abstract
Radical neck dissection is able to resect the cervical tissue completely and certain to control cervical lymphnode metastasis, but postoperative injury is very great. Conservatie neck dissection (modified neck dissection or partial neck dissection) is available to decrease postoperative complaint, but is considered to have a high risk of cervical recurrence. In principle of National Cancer Center Hospital, therapeutic neck dessection is performed as conservatively as possible, only invasive tissue is resected. In order to evaluate this policy, prognosis of 127 cases of oral cancer with radical neck dissection was compared with that of 95 cases with conservative neck dissection since 1981 to 1990 in National Cancer Center Hospital retrospectively. Prognosis of radical neck dissection was 43.2% of 5 year survival, modified neck dissection and partial neck dissection (supraomohyoidal neck dissection) was 63.2% of 5 year survival. Local cervical recurrence (1.5%) of conservative neck dissection was less than that (11.0%) of radical neck dissection thogh recurrence of primary lesion or parapharyngeal space was even. Though N-stage of radical neck dissection was slightly more advanced than that of moified neck dissection and there was nonsense to check statistically significant difference between two groups, it is probable that modified neck dissection is not inferior to radical neck dissection in prognosis.
