Overall distribution of lymph node metastases
The frequency of LN metastases at each neck level is shown in Table 2.
Overall, fifty-four of the sixty-three NDs were performed in cN+ve
necks; of these, fifty-three were subsequently staged as pN+ve and one
as pN0. The remaining nine NDs were performed in cN0 necks. Of these
four (44%) were subsequently pN+ve, of which disease was invariably in
Level II, and five remained pN0. This yielded an overall sensitivity of
93% and a specificity of 83% for cN0 staging in p16+ve OPSCC.