Surgical treatment of parotid tumors in the General Community Hospital

We reviewed 51 consecutive parotidectomies done at a general community hospital and gathered data on age and sex of the patients, length of stay in the hospital, perioperative outcome, complications, and surgical pathology. Statistical method included logistic regression and ANOVA to determine relationship and dependence of the variables. There were 24 male and 27 female patients. Thirty-six (70.6%) of the parotid tumors were benign. There were no major complications. Treatment of parotid tumors in the community hospital is feasible and safe if basic guidelines are implemented. The epidemiology of parotid tumors in the relatively smaller hospital should resemble that reported in the literature. Our data suggest that parotid malignancy may occur more frequently in elderly men and that length of stay in the hospital may be longer for patients having surgery for malignant than for benign parotid tumors.