Liposarcomas rarely occur in the parapharyngeal space and only a few case reports exist. For curative therapy of liposarcoma, surgical excision remains the dominant modality. Although a wide surgical margin is important to prevent local recurrence, wide excision is often difficult in the head and neck region.

We report a case of a 19-year-old female with a well-differentiated liposarcoma arising in the parapharyngeal space. We removed the tumour surgically utilising a cervical–parotid approach. The histological diagnosis was well-differentiated sclerosing liposarcoma. There is no recurrence after five years and nine months of follow up.

The patient's age and the tumour site made it difficult for us to make a quantitative diagnosis before the operation. Well-differentiated liposarcoma rarely develop distant metastasis, but often recur locally. The benefit of adjuvant radiotherapy for well-differentiated liposarcoma is still not clear and careful and long-term follow up is necessary.

We report an extremely rare case of the oropharyngeal form of tularaemia, causing a parapharyngeal abscess.

A 48-year-old woman presented with fever, sore throat, breathing difficulty and a right-sided neck swelling. This mass had previously been treated with penicillin without response, and had already been surgically drained once in another hospital. On physical examination, the tonsils were exudative and hypertrophic and the pharynx was hyperaemic. A fluctuant, 4 × 4 cm mass was seen on endoscopic examination, originating from the left parapharyngeal area and protruding towards the pyriform sinus, and partly obstructing the airway. Microagglutination test antibody titres for Francisella tularensis were positive (1/1280). The patient healed completely after definitive drainage of the abscess and antimicrobial therapy for 14 days (streptomycin, 2 × 1 g intramuscularly).

Tularaemia should be considered in the differential diagnosis of patients presenting with tonsillopharyngitis, cervical lymphadenitis and parapharyngeal abscess who do not respond to treatment with penicillin, even if they do not live in an endemic region.