Functional neck dissection. Anatomical grounds, surgical technique, clinical observations.

The anatomical grounds of and surgical technique for functional neck dissection are described in detail in order to demonstrate that the radicalism of this procedure, from the viewpoint of surgical anatomy, is by no means less than that of the classical (so-called radical) neck dissection. From 1972 to 1978, 476 operations were performed (211 patients treated bilaterally and 54 unilaterally). The percentage of false negatives (ie, histologically proven metastases in clinically unsuspected nodes) was 14%, while the percentage of false positives (histological negativity in clinically suspected nodes) reached 53%. The total number of local recurrences in a three-year follow-up was nine (3.5%).