Abstract

Lipomatous lesions of the parotid gland are very rare. They are usually noticed by chance during the diagnosis of other parotid gland masses. The most common clinical finding is in the form of a painless, slowly growing mass in the neck. It is rare that the parotid gland lipomas originate from deep lobes and it is even exceptional that it extends to the parapharyngeal area. Herein, we report a case of parotid lipomas with a parapharyngeal extension in a 70-year-old male patient. The mass showed distinctive increase in density and fat suppression on T1 and T2 weighted magnetic resonance imaging. It was completely removed, including the superficial parotid tissue, via the transcervical approach. In this study, we emphasize that lipomatous lesions s hould also be kept in mind during the evaluation of parotid masses and that the magnetic resonance imaging has a high diagnostic value in parotid tumors.