ABSTRACT
Odontogenic cysts are jaw lesions that may be misdiagnosed due to lack of complete data. Clinical, radiographic and histopathological correlation is required for the diagnosis of these cysts. The study was thus designed to determine frequency and compare the histopathological features of radicular cysts and odontogenic keratocysts in population of Northern Pakistan. The study was conducted at Sardar Begum Dental College and Khyber College of Dentistry, Peshawar. Non-probability, consecutive sampling technique was used to select 70 cases of odontogenic cysts from 190 cystic jaw lesions. Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue samples of Odontogenic keratocysts [n=22] and radicular cysts [n=48] were retrieved from the archives of Khyber College of Dentistry and Sardar Begum Dental College, Peshawar. Frequencies of the cysts were calculated. These were then evaluated for histopathological variables which included thickness of epithelial lining, keratinization, foamy macrophages, mucous cells, Rushton bodies, cholesterol crystals and haemosiderin. Chi-square test/ Fishers exact test was applied to compare cysts. The data was analyzed using SPSS version 21. Frequency of the radicular cyst and odontogenic keratocyst was 68.5% [48N] and 31.5% [22N] re-spectively. The histopathological features showed presence of mucous cells, vacuolated cells, spongiosis, micro-abscesses, cholesterol crystals, hemosiderin and inflammatory infiltrate. The radicular cyst was the most prevalent in our study 48[68.5%], followed by the odontogenic keratocysts 22[31.5%]. The histopathological features observed in these cysts are comparable with other populations of Pakistan and abroad