Current Insights into Oral Cancer Diagnostics

Abstract

Oral cancer is one of the most common head and neck malignancies and has an overall 5-year survival rate that remains below 50%. Oral cancer is generally preceded by oral potentially malignant disorders (OPMDs) but determining the risk of OPMD progressing to cancer remains a difficult task. Several diagnostic technologies have been developed to facilitate the detection of OPMD and oral cancer, and some of these have been translated into regulatory-approved in vitro diagnostic systems or medical devices. Furthermore, the rapid development of novel biomarkers, electronic systems, and artificial intelligence may help to develop a new era where OPMD and oral cancer are detected at an early stage. To date, a visual oral examination remains the routine first-line method of identifying oral lesions; however, this method has certain limitations and as a result, patients are either diagnosed when their cancer reaches a severe stage or a high-risk patient with OPMD is misdiagnosed and left untreated. The purpose of this article is to review the currently available diagnostic methods for oral cancer as well as possible future applications of novel promising technologies to oral cancer diagnosis. This will potentially increase diagnostic options and improve our ability to effectively diagnose and treat oral cancerous-related lesions.

Evaluation of YouTube videos as a source of information about oral self-examination to detect oral cancer and precancerous lesions

“…[ 2 ] Early detection of oral cancer is of the utmost importance, and this facilitates diagnosis, treatment, and monitoring of the disease. [ 3 ]…”

Improving the Diagnostic Performance by Adding Methylation Marker to Conventional Visual Examination in Identifying Oral Cancer

“…A global oral cancer forum (GOCF) in 2016 suggested that the interpretation of VOE results may greatly depend on the competence of the examiner and requires training and calibration of screeners. Therefore, depending solely on VOE by clinicians to distinguish various OPMDs with diverse clinical features may increase the risk of missing early malignant lesions [ 2 , 3 , 8 ]. An analysis by the Taiwan Health Promotion Administration demonstrated that the VOE positivity rate differs across healthcare units, including medical centers, regional hospitals, district hospitals, and local clinics.…”

Feasibility of Near-Infrared Spectroscopy for Identification of L-Fucose and L-Proline—Towards Detecting Cancer Biomarkers from Saliva

“…Visual observation and palpation used in clinical practices lead to poor accuracy of diagnosis. Oral potential malignant disorders (OPMD) and oral squamous cell cancers (OSCC) are diagnosed using histopathological analysis of surgically removed tissue biopsies stained using hematoxylin and eosin dyes [1,2], which are highly invasive, expensive, and timeconsuming [3].…”

“…Optical methods based on fluorescence or chemiluminescence [1,2] can be used to confirm the presence of lesions but these methods cannot differentiate between low-risk and high-risk lesions [4,5]. Spectral cameras, such as VELScope, have not been able to distinguish between pre-malignant and malignant tissues more reliably than experienced Appl.…”