The Prevalence and Pattern of Non-Odontogenic Tumours of the Jaws in a Nigerian Tertiary Hospital

Abstract

Objective: Though odontogenic tumours of the jaws are well studied globally it appears there is paucity of data on the non-odontogenic tumours of the jaws.  The objective of the study was to determine the prevalence and pattern of non-odontogenic tumours of the jaws in a Nigerian tertiary hospital.

Methods: This was a retrospective study on patients diagnosed histologically of non-odontogenic tumours of the jaws from September 2017 to September 2022 in the departments of oral and maxillofacial surgery of a Nigerian teaching hospital. Data were collected from the register and case-notes of the patients. Patients with incomplete information were excluded. Data collected were age, gender, location of tumor, origin of tumour, and type of tumour. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were performed. Data was analyzed using SPSS version 21. A P- Value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results: The age of the patients ranged from 18-87 years with a mean age of 45.3±20.1 years. There were more males with a male to female ratio of 1.1: 1. The prevalence of non-odontogenic tumour was 33.2%. More than half (55.0%) of the patients had the tumors located on the mandible. More than two-third (69.4%) of the tumours were of mesenchymal origin. A higher (69.4%) proportion of the patients had malignant non-odontogenic tumours. Malignancy of odontogenic tumours were associated with the age of the patient and the origin of the tumours (P<0.05).

Conclusion: The prevalence of non-odontogenic tumours is high in our environment. More malignant non-odontogenic tumours were seen in the middle age group of 35-59 years and tumours of mesenchymal origin were also found to be more malignant.