An unusual case report of unicystic ameloblastoma of the mandible

Abstract

There are plenty of benign lesions that can result in swelling of the mandible, and these can be classified as odontogenic and non-odontogenic lesions. Among the categories of odontogenic lesion, ameloblastoma is the most occurring lesion that takes origin from the epithelial cellular elements and dental tissues in their different stages of development. Ameloblastoma is the most serious odontogenic neoplasm due to its prevalence and clinical characteristics. Ameloblastoma is a broad class which encompasses 80% of solid multicystic type of ameloblastoma with unicystic ameloblastoma (UA) variant included as vital clinicopathological form claiming the rest 20% along with peripheral ameloblastoma variant. UA refers to cystic lesions that seem like jaw cysts clinically, radiographically, or grossly but are lined by typical ameloblastomatous epithelium, with or without luminal and/or mural tumor development, on histologic investigation. Around 5–15% of all ameloblastic lesions do not have a propensity to metastasis, and this is UA. Unicystic mural form, although slow growing overall, is very invasive locally and has a high recurrence rate. As UA tumors show very close features with dentigerous cyst, a very sharp differential diagnosis protocol need to be executed to exclude the other unicystic odontogenic lesions considering the clinical, radiological, and biological characteristics along with proper follow-up and seeing any recurrence of the lesion taking place. Here, we report the case of a twenty-one year male patient with UA of the mandible and review of the literature.

Keywords

• ameloblastoma
• odontogenic tumor
• unicystic