OBJECTIVES: Surgery for recurrent pleomorphic adenoma (PA) can be challenging and may increase the risk of operative complications, particularly facial nerve weakness. As observation may be a viable alternative to surgery for slow-growing tumors, our objective was to assess the growth rate of recurrent PAs.
STUDY DESIGN: This study is a case series of patients at our tertiary academic medical center with recurrent PA. Two magnetic resonance images (MRI) were compared; total volume (TV) of recurrent tumor on both studies was calculated to obtain our main outcomes of percent change in TV and tumor growth rate.
RESULTS: Fourteen patients with recurrent PA had a median interval time between MRI of 12.8 months. Though growth rates were variable, the median continuous compound growth per year was 10.2%. Notably, 3 patients (21%) had no growth, and 2 patients (14%) had a reduction in TV.
CONCLUSIONS: The median growth rate for enlarging tumors is estimated at 10.2% per year. Due to variability, tumor growth rate should be estimated on an individual patient basis. For slow-growing tumors, physicians may weigh the risk of this slow growth with the morbidity of reoperation.