In an attempt to develop neck dissection procedures that more specifically addressed early stage neck metastases, a number of variations and modifications of the classical radical neck dissection have been developed. Consequently, most contemporary surgeons employ a wider repertoire of techniques for removing nodal metastases. Concurrent with this growth in surgical options, a multitude of terms used to describe such procedures also emerged. Under most circumstances, these were originally proposed by individual authors without any uniformity of terminology and thus lacked any form of standardization. Unfortunately, this often resulted in redundancy, misinterpretation, and even confusion among clinicians. Realizing the importance for standardizing the diverse nomenclature, the Committee for Head and Neck Surgery and Oncology of the American Academy of Otolaryngology–Head and Neck Surgery (AAO-HNS) convened a special task force to address the terminology problems related to cervical lymphadenectomy. The specific objectives of the group were: (1) to recommend terminology that adhered to more traditional terms such as “radical” and “modified radical” neck dissection and to avoid the use of eponyms and acronyms; (2) to define which lymphatic structures and other nonlymphatic structures should be removed or preserved relative to the radical neck dissection; (3) to provide standard nomenclature for the lymph node groups and nonlymphatic structures;(4) to define the boundaries of resection for lymph node groups; (5) to use terms for the neck dissection procedures that are basic and easy to understand; and (6) to develop a classification based on the biology of the cervical metastases and the principles of oncologic surgery.<sup>8 Robbins K.T., Medina J.E., Wolfe G.T. , et al. Standardizing neck dissection terminology Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg 1991 ;  117 : 601-605

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