Comparison of histopathological diagnoses of ENT diseases in the COVID-19 pandemic with other periods

Abstract OBJECTIVE. It is aimed to reveal the frequency of histopathological diagnosis in ENT diseases during the COVID-19 period and whether it is different from diagnoses in other periods. MATERIAL AND METHODS. The files of 1442 patients diagnosed with pathological material in the ENT clinic between 2017 and 2022 were retrospectively scanned. Two groups were created: the 1st group of patients between 2017-2019 (non-COVID-19 period) (Group 1) and the 2nd group of patients between 2020-2022 (COVID-19 period) (Group 2). RESULTS. Pathological samples were sent from 1163 patients in Group 1 and from 279 patients in Group 2. Of 1442 patients, 815 were male and 627 were female, and the mean age was 25 (3-94 years). There was a statistically significant difference between the groups in terms of age (p=0.001). There was no significant difference in terms of gender (p=0.756). The most common histopathological diagnoses in both periods were chronic tonsillitis lymphoid hyperplasia (bilateral tonsillectomy + adenoidectomy) (19.5%), chronic inflammation lymphoid hyperplasia (adenoidectomy) (19.3%) and nasal polyp (19.2%). The incidence of malignant tumors was found to be 1.4% in Group 1 and 2.8% in Group 2. The incidence of benign tumors was found to be 7.6% in Group 1 and 12.8% in Group 2. In terms of frequency, the ratio of malignant and benign tumors was higher in Group 2. CONCLUSION. The number of patients with histopathological diagnoses decreased due to the decrease in hospitalizations during the COVID-19 period. Delayed diagnosis in malignant pathologies significantly worsens the prognosis. All these results show that new cancer diagnostic strategies are needed for epidemic diseases such as COVID-19.