Ultrasonography of inflammatory soft tissue swellings of the head and neck.

Experience with 107 B-scan sonographs of inflammatory soft tissue swellings of the head and neck is described, and an echomorphologic classification is proposed which consists of the following five types: edema, infiltrate, preabscess, echo-poor, and echo-free abscess. Because the clinical course of the symptoms differs significantly between the last three types, it was concluded that they represent different stages of abscess formation. A comparison of all the physical and sonographic diagnoses showed only slightly higher sensitivity for sonography. However, with regard to the specific diagnosis of abscess, the sonographic examination seemed to be superior to the clinical diagnosis.