Surgery is the primary treatment of salivary gland and tongue cancer. The objective is to achieve a full resection of the tumor while maintaining a sufficient margin of healthy tissue. Insufficient margins can result in a heightened risk of local cancer recurrence and poorer oncological outcome. The golden standard for evaluating resection margins is histopathology, though this takes several days requiring reoperation in case of insufficient resection margins. Imaging of the resected surgical specimen ex vivo is proposed to enhance margin assessment in surgery and optimize surgical outcomes.

The aim of this study is therefore to examine the accuracy of 3D ultrasound and MRI compared to clinical examination and histopathology in tumor resection margins. If successful, the use of per operative imaging help reduce local cancer recurrence and the need for reoperation and improve the oncological outcome.