The Applicability of Ultrasound in the Diagnosis of Inflammatory and Obstructive Diseases of the Major Salivary Glands: a Scoping Review

Objectives: The purpose of the present scoping review was to determine the contribution of ultrasound images in the diagnosis of inflammatory and obstructive diseases of the major salivary glands (MSGs).

Methods: A search of studies of ultrasonographic assessments of human samples was performed in several electronic databases and grey literature up to July 2021. The extracted data were the examined MSG; the diagnostic value of ultrasound (sensibility, specificity, positive- and negative predictive value, accuracy); features of lesions, including number, echogenicity, echotexture, form, margins, size, posterior acoustic aspect, and location; and related clinical information, such as swelling, palpation, sensible to pain, salivation, lymph nodes, recurrence, duration, and causes.

Results: After verifying the eligibility criteria, 90 articles focused on detecting inflammatory, and obstructive diseases of the MSG were gathered, with variable study designs and size samples. A wide variety of pathologies were assessed, including sialolitiasis ( = 45), acute sialadenitis ( = 30), chronic sialadenitis ( = 25), granulamatous diseases ( = 15), Kuttner's tumor ( = 11), juvenile recurrent parotitis ( = 9), abscess ( = 7), post-radiotherapy sialadenitis ( = 6), sialadenosis ( = 9), abscess ( = 7), IgG4-related disease sialadenitis ( = 5), HIV-sialadenitis ( = 4), obstructive sialadenitis ( = 3), iodinated contrast-induced sialadenitis ( = 2), and pneumoparotitis ( = 1). Most studies were case reports or series of cases. Few studies exhibited data about the accuracy of ultrasound in detecting MSG diseases.

Conclusions: The present scoping review concluded that ultrasound aspects of different MSG pathologies are similar but contribute to their differential diagnosis and can be considered as a valuable initial method for assessing the MSG of adults and children.