Trans-lingual biopsy of the tongue base under local anaesthetic – a new technique

Abstract

Aim: The tongue base is an important anatomical area to biopsy when searching for an unknown head and neck primary malignancy. Additionally biopsies must be taken when a clinically apparent tongue base lesion is present and malignancy is suspected. It can be extremely challenging to obtain a meaningful biopsy result for a variety of reasons. Patients who present with head and neck malignancy often come with an array of medical co-morbidities and therefore subjecting them to the risks of a general anaesthetic may not be appropriate. Materials and methods:We present a novel technique of tongue base biopsy which can be performed under local anaesthetic. Alongside this we present a case in which this technique has been utilized by the senior author.Results: The patient presented above had multiple inadequate conventional tonguebase biopsies. Our novel technique yielded a positive result allowing the patient to continue treatment of his recurrent disease. Conclusion:The trans-lingual biopsy of the tongue base under local anaesthetic is a simple, safe and cost effective way to obtain a tissue diagnosis in tongue base malignancy. We believe it to be reproducible and easy to teach.