CASE REPORT   

European Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery 2021 April;5(1):31-5

DOI: 10.23736/S2532-3466.20.00211-8

Copyright © 2020 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

Endoscopic endonasal approach to infratemporal fossa for V2 trigeminal schwannoma

Evaristo BELLI, Aleksandr KAPITONOV ✉, Marta ZAPPALÀ

Department of Maxillo-Facial Surgery, Sant’Andrea Hospital, Rome, Italy

The infratemporal fossa (ITF) and pterygopalatine fossa (PPF) are small deep areas difficult to access. Fortunately, tumors within the ITF are rare lesions making up less than 1% of the head and neck tumors. Although trigeminal schwannomas only account for up 0.36% of all intracranial neoplasms. When these areas need to be addressed the standard procedure is preauricular temporal/subtemporal approach, that requires an emicoronal incision and important demolitive surgical steps that could result in significant aesthetic and functional deficits. In the recent years along with development of neuroendoscopic technology the endoscopic transnasal approach to the skull base has become universally accepted. Despite this there are only a few reports in the literature involving the use of the endoscopic endonasal approach for the removal of trigeminal schwannoma involving ITF or PPF. We presented a clinical case of trigeminal schwannoma of the ITF removed by endoscopic approach with neuronavigation system assistance, which in our case was helpful to determine anatomical landmarks and to remove the tumor completely and securely.

KEY WORDS: Infratemporal fossa; Endoscopy; Neurilemmoma; Neuronavigation