Treatment of Head and Neck Venous Malformations with Sodium Tetradecyl Sulfate

• Main Authors: Ebrahim Karimi MD, Mehrdad Jafari MD, Keyvan Aghazadeh MD, Saeed Sohrabpour MD, Fatemeh Tavakolnejad MD
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: SAGE Publishing 2018-09-01
• Series: OTO Open
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.1177/2473974X18797067

Objective The purpose of this study was to discuss the clinical outcomes and complications of treating venous malformations with sclerotherapy, with sodium tetradecyl sulfate as the sclerosing agent. Study Design Case series with planned data collection. Setting Amiralam Hospital—a referral otolaryngology–head and neck surgery hospital affiliated with Tehran University of Medical Sciences. Subjects and Methods A total of 345 patients with venous malformations were treated with sclerotherapy with sodium tetradecyl sulfate 3% (1 mL for every 1 cm 3 of the lesion). The venous malformation location, treatments before the current sclerotherapy with sodium tetradecyl sulfate, the number of sclerotherapy sessions, and complications resulting from sclerotherapy were recorded. Follow-up assessments were done for a minimum of 1 year following the procedure. A favorable outcome was defined as a 50% decrease in the lesion size based on clinical and radiologic assessments. Results A total of 759 injection sessions were documented, ranging from 1 to 6 injections per patient (mean = 3.1). The follow-up duration ranged from 12 to 84 months (mean = 55 months). Based on clinical assessment, a 50% reduction of size was reported for 95.6% of the patients. According to the imaging before and after the procedures, a 50% reduction of size was seen among 67.3% of the patients. Conclusion The results of the study showed that the use of sodium tetradecyl sulfate as a sclerosing substance can effectively reduce the size of venous malformation lesions.