Frontal sinus malignancies

Malignant neoplasms originating from the paranasal sinuses account for 3% of all malignancies arising from head and neck sites [21].Within the paranasal sinuses, the maxillary sinus is the primary site of 60%-70% of malignancies, followed by the nasal cavity in 20%-30% and the ethmoid sinuses in 10%-15% [26, 35]. The frontal sinus is the primary site of malignancy in less than 2% of cases, more often being involved by extension of a tumor arising elsewhere [3, 25, 36, 48]. Because of their rarity, institutional experiences with malignancies arising from the frontal sinus remain largely anecdotal,with no large series reported to date. Malignancies arising from the frontal sinus are not included in the staging system for paranasal sinus neoplasms promoted by the American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) [2]. The most commonly used staging system currently applied to cases of frontal sinus malignancies was developed at the University of Florida for tumors of the nasal cavity, sphenoid, and frontal sinuses [25].