Lingual thyroid is a relatively rare developmental anomaly resulting from the failure of
thyroid primordium to migrate from its embryonic site of origin, the foramen cecum, to its
normal anatomic position in the neck. Although postmortem studies have shown an
incidence of 10% for lingual thyroid, the clinical incidence is much lower and varies between
1 in 3,000 and 1 in 100,000.1 (http://www. entjournal. com/# refs) It is likely that the only
thyroid tissue in these patients is the lingual thyroid. 2 (http://www. entjournal. com/# refs) …

Discussion To date, only 44 cases of lingual thyroid carcinoma have been reported. 4, 10 Of
these 44 patients, 26 were female patients and 16 were male patients (2 reports did not
identify the gender and age of the patient). The age ranged from 12 to 86 years, with a
median age of 37 years. Pathologically, these neoplasms were described as follicular
carcinoma in 11 cases, papillary carcinoma in 11, adenocarcinoma in 5, Hürthle cell
carcinoma in 2, undifferentiated in 1, and unclassified in 14. Only follicular cell-derived …