Management of cervical lymph node metastasis in tonsillar squamous cell carcinoma: Is it necessary to treat node-negative contralateral neck?

Patients with tonsillar SCC require thorough ipsilateral neck treatment because of the high probability of nodal metastasis and the close association between lymph node metastasis and survival. The contralateral cN+ neck should also be treated; however, the contralateral cN0 neck might be preserved with caution on the cases with poorly differentiated primary tumors and/or ipsilateral cN+ necks.