Ultrasound of soft tissues in the neck and salivary glands

Ультразвуковое исследование (УЗИ) представляет a method of studying the body with the help of ultrasonic waves. It has found wide distribution in medicine, due to its safety and high level of informativeness. To diagnose the pathological processes developing in the salivary glands, as well as in the neck region, ultrasound of soft tissues is perhaps the most common method. At the same time, many diseases can be identified at early stages of their development.

The neck ultrasound is indicated in the following situations:

• The presence of palpable formation in the cervical region;
• occurrence of suspected developmentpathological process in the carotid arteries, which is most often detected on the basis of symptoms of insufficient blood flow in them, as well as coarse noise during auscultation of these vessels.

Стоит отметить, что во втором случае УЗИ мягких tissues in the neck area is an additional method of diagnosis. To clarify the diagnosis in any case will have to carry out doplerogram of the carotid arteries.

As a result of the ultrasonicstudies in the cervical region can be found with sufficient ease and a high degree of promptness to identify both focal and diffuse pathological changes:

Focal:

• Nodal (solid) education (they areare the most common finding after conducting such a diagnosis, with most of them being adenomatous changes in the thyroid gland, the risk of malignancy is quite low);
• cysts (true cystic formations occurrarely, they are diagnosed if they have a clear, even outline with an anechoic cavity (except when a hemorrhage has occurred in the cyst cavity));
• abscesses and hemorrhages (with ultrasound most often look like echogenic formations with fuzzy contours and anechogenous cavity inside if there is no hemorrhage);
• calcifications (these hyperechoic structures are most often characteristic of adenomas of the thyroid gland, however, can serve as a sign and malignant formations).

Diffuse:

• an enlargement of the thyroid gland in size while maintaining a uniform echostructure;
• an increase in the thyroid gland in size with the determination of the heterogeneity of the echostructure.

The first variant of diffuse changes says inthe use of such diseases as endemic goiter, pubertal hyperplasia, thyrotoxicosis, post-resection vicar hyperplasia of the thyroid gland. In the second case, it is possible to suspect the development of multinodular goiter or autoimmune thyroiditis.

Carrying out of such diagnostic procedure, as US of salivary glands, becomes really rational only in the event that there is at least one of the following symptoms:

• increase in the size of submandibular and parotid salivary glands under the condition of a simultaneous increase in body temperature;
• the presence of palpable formations in the submandibular, parotid and / or hyoid area;
• presence of pain, discomfort and / or swelling in the submandibular, parotid and / or hyoid area.

The ultrasound of soft tissues in the salivary gland allows revealing the following pathological processes:

• cysts;
• abscesses;
• benign and malignant tumors;
• narrowing or widening of gland ducts;
• sialadenosis;
• sialodenite;
• sialoliths.

Conducted in the early period, ultrasound of soft tissuesoften allows to identify the disease at the earliest stages of development and take rational measures for its treatment, which significantly increases the patient's chances of recovery.