Neurilemmoma of the head and neck--report of 3 cases

Neurilemmoma are benign tumors of the nerve-sheath, also known as schwannoma. Beside intracranial manifestation, neurilemmoma are found at other peripheral nerves of the head and neck. We present three cases of patients with seldom manifestation of neurilemmoma of the supraglottis, the retropharyngeal space and a neurilemmoma of the hypoglossal nerve. The histological examination showed two types of Antoni-A-neurilemmoma, whereas one tumor was found with mixed type A and B-neurilemmoma. Although extracranial neurilemmoma of retropharygeal space, neck or supraglottic larynx are rare tumors, neurilemmoma should be involved in differential diagnosis of tumors in these areas. The therapy of choice consists of complete surgical removal and histological examination.