Abstract
Cervicofacial actinomycosis being one of the unusual infections is of high relevance to a head and neck onco-surgeon. As the diagnosis may be made difficult by its nature to mimic malignancy and egregiously low culture sensitivity, the differential diagnosis for a lesion appearing to be malignant after irradiation does not usually include actinomycotic infection. Treatment usually requires a long-term antibiotic course after confirmation with histopathology, albeit surgical debridement is required in selective cases. Here we report two cases that were clinico-radiologically diagnosed as osteoradionecrosis and histopathological analysis done to rule out cancer recurrence. Unanticipated, they turned out to be cervicofacial actinomycosis, subsequently treated with long-term antibiotics following which the infection subsided.
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Murali, T.V., Poorna, T.A., Jayalakshmy, P.L. et al. The Great Imitator: Cervicofacial Actinomycosis Masquerading as Cancer Recurrence. Indian J Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg 75, 3960–3963 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12070-023-03993-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12070-023-03993-x