Blue Parotid Unveiled: A Rare Case of Traumatic Hemorrhagic Parotid Lymphangioma in an Eight-Year-Old Boy

Parotid lymphangioma is a benign lymphatic malformation commonly observed in infancy or early childhood. It often grows insidiously and presents as a painless, soft fluctuant mass. We report a case of an eight-year-old boy who was diagnosed from another center with right parotid lymphangioma of one-year duration. He presented with right painful preauricular swelling and trismus for nine days after a recent history of blunt trauma to the preauricular caused an acute expansion of the swelling and subsequently, the patient developed ipsilateral facial nerve palsy. Examination showed right preauricular swelling measuring about 6 x 6 cm that extended posteriorly until the mastoid region, superiorly until the zygoma, and inferiorly until the angle of the mandible, pushing the ear lobule anteromedially. There was bluish discoloration of the overlying skin. The swelling was warm and tender on palpation. Multiple shotty lymph nodes were palpable at the posterior triangle. Aspiration of the swelling revealed blood content, but it reaccumulated after a few hours. A magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the neck showed a lesion confined within the parotid gland. There was a presence of air-fluid level with dependent layers of hyperintense on the T1-weighted image (T1WI) and T2-weighted image (T2WI) with clumps of isointensity on T1WI, which are hypointense on T2WI, which is suggestive of acute-late subacute blood product. A diagnosis of lymphatic malformation complicated with hemorrhage was made. Hence, the patient underwent surgery for the evacuation of blood clot and right superficial parotidectomy. Histopathological examination of the intraoperative tissue biopsy revealed evidence of venolymphatic malformation of the parotid gland. Postoperatively, he was discharged home after three days. The facial nerve function recovered from House and Brackmann grade II to grade I three weeks after the surgery.