Surgical management of unicystic ameloblastoma: conservative or radical approach: a systematic review

Unicystic ameloblastoma is a benign epithelial odontogenic neoplasm that represents about 5 to 15% of all intraosseous ameloblastomas, its biological behavior is related to its histopathological subtypes, with the mural variant being the most aggressive. The objective of this systematic review was to evaluate in the scientific literature the effectiveness of the conservative and radical surgical approach in the treatment of unicysticameloblastomas. A systematic literature review was performed using the Science Direct, Embase, Cochrane Collaboration Library, and PubMed/MEDLINE databases. Studies related to conservative and radical surgical therapies for the treatment of unicysticameloblastomas were selected. The search strategy provided a total of 791 studies. After screening by reading the titles and abstracts, 25 studies were considered potentially eligible and read in full by the evaluators. At the end of the analysis, five articles met all the inclusion criteria and were included in this systematic review. Studies have shown that a conservative surgical approach for the treatment of unicystic ameloblastoma is recommended only for the luminal and intra-luminal variants, and is not recommended for the mural subtype. However, in order to carry out a radical treatment, one must take into account the age and health conditions of the patient. Post-surgical clinical and radiographic monitoring is of fundamental importance for early detection of recurrence.