A clinical study of oral carcinoma

Data of a total of 62 patients with oral carcinoma treated at the University of Tsukuba Hospital between January 2001 and December 2010 were reviewed. Out of the 62 patients, in 59, the tumors were histopathologically diagnosed as squamous cell carcinoma (SCC), and the remaining three as verrucous carcinoma. Treatment for each patient was determined according to the tumor, nodes and metastasis (TNM) classification (Union for International Cancer Control (UICC), 1997) and the histopathological features. The three patients with verrucous carcinoma in whom the tumors were insensitive to radiation or chemotherapy were treated surgically. For stage I or II SCC cases, except for tongue cancer, full-dose irradiation was the treatment of choice. For cases of stage I or II tongue cancer, brachytherapy (RALS) or surgery was the treatment of choice. In stage III or IV cases, the treatment of choice was a combination of surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy. The 5-year survival rate of the SCC cases, overall, was 62.6% as analyzed by the Kaplan-Meier method, while the rates for the stage I, II, III, and IV cases were 100%, 75.6%, 37.5%, and 40.7%, respectively. (author)