Clinical studies of the squamous cell carcinoma of the lower gum

Abstract

A clinical study was made of 69 cases, 50 male and 19 female of squamous cell carcinoma of the lower gum treated at the Oral Surgery Department of Hokkaido University, School of Dentistry between 1970 January and 1983 December.
Ages at first visit ranged from 29 to 83 years old but about 95% were over 50 years old. The majority had clinically advanced disease. Fifty four had radiologically abnormal findings of alveolar crest or mandible, and 30 had clinically metastasis lymph node at the first diagnosis.
The three year absolute cure rate for all cases was 54.9%. In the comparison of treatment modality, the cure rate treated by surgery was clearly superior to that by radiation therapy and/or chemotherapy: The cure rate of the former was 75.0% and that of the latter was 21.1%. Post-operative tumor control rate was related to the radiological findings of the mandible. The recurrent rate of patients who had radiologically an irregular lytic destruction of the mandible was 42% and that of patients who exhibited an erosion or change of the alveolar crest or mandible was 15%. These results indicate that wide resection with plenty of safety margin is necessary in lower gum canccr that radiologically had irregular lytic destruction.