Methods: A descriptive and analytical study was carried out, reviewing medical records, radiographies, tomographies and histopathologic slides of patients from the Institute of Neoplastic Diseases, who had been diagnosed with osteosarcomas of the jaws. The data covers a 55-year period.
Results: 78 patients were diagnosed with osteosarcomas of the jaws, corresponding to 44 females and 34 males with a mean age of 31.83±16.18 years (range 5-76). The most frequent localization was the lower left jaw (30.77%) and the average sizes of lesions were 7.71±4.75 cm (range 2-26). Most of them had facial asymmetry (83.33%) and the most frequent symptom was pain (57.69%). Radiographic findings: erosion (87.5%), periodontal space widening (81.25%), loss of lamina dura (81.25%), expansion of the jaws (81.25%), no defined edges (68.75%) and “floating tooth” (62.5%). Tomographic features: erosion (12/12), expansion of the jaws (11/12), hyperdensity (9/12), no defined edges (11/12), “floating tooth” (6/12) and displacement of tooth roots (6/12). The histopathological variants were: osteoblastic (59.32%), chondroblastic (27.12%), fibroblastic (8.48%), mixed (3.39%) and pleomorphic (1.69%). Immunohistochemical expression: only vimentin was positive; S-100, CD45, CD68, HHF35, factor VIII, sinaptofisina, mioglobulin and EMA were negatives. The main treatments were both surgical and chemotherapy (28.20%), and only surgical (23.08%). State of survival of patients: died (29.49%) and disease-free survival (21.8%). Mean time of survival was 8.5 years, mean time to recurrence 3.3 years and the mean time to detection of metastasis was 9 months.
Conclusions: The data of this study about osteosarcomas of the jaws, which are uncommon, suggests that imaging features other than histopathology are important for their diagnosis. However, they had a better prognosis than osteosarcoma of the long bones.