AbstractBackground: The nasal cavity and the paranasal sinuses form a single functional unit. Malignant sinonasal tumours are characterized by low incidence, non specific symptoms, and late presentation. The malignant sinonasal tumours encompass an entire range of both epithelial and non-epithelial tumours. Aims & Objectives: Our study aims to determine incidence, age, sex, site, mode of presentation and histological types of various malignant sinonasal tumours over a 5 year period. Methods: 107 malignant sinonasal tumors biopsied or surgically excised over a period of five years were studied. Results: We encountered 107 cases of malignant tumors with an incidence of 0.24%. Malignant tumors occurred with a mean age of 52.05 years and the male to female ratio was 2.3:1.Among malignant tumors, epithelial tumors (97 cases) constituting 90.65% predominated over non epithelial tumors (10 cases) constituting 9.35% with a ratio of 9.7:1. Out of the 107 cases 58 tumors involved the nasal cavity (54.21%) and 49 involved paranasal sinuses (45.79%). The most common malignant tumor encountered was squamous cell carcinoma-60 cases (56.07%). Conclusion: The clinical and radiological features of masses of nasal cavity and paranasal sinuses are overlapping and often only a provisional diagnosis is possible. Definite diagnosis requires histopathological examination.
Keywords: Sinonasal Tract; Malignancy; Squamous Cell Carcinoma; Epithelial; Nonepithelial.