THE SIMPLEST cause for enlargement of cervical lymph nodes is infection. In severe pyogenic infections actual suppuration of the lymph nodes may occur. This adenitis subsides promptly with the elimination of the primary condition.1
Often it seems that one is in such a hurry to prove that a lateral neck mass is metastatic carcinoma from a hidden primary tumor in the epipharynx or one lurking in the shadows of an antral sinus, that he neglects the much more obvious origins of some lateral neck masses. Then as the diagnostic workup becomes more complicated and as time passes and the neck mass grows progressively smaller, one wonders, just before the biopsy, if perhaps he hasn't been devoting too much time to the wrong areas. This may be confirmed when the patient announces that a trip to the dentist is imminent because of that back molar which has been bothering him,