Stopping all the habits of tobacco consumption. Stopping means complete stop
to the habit. Reducing the consumption of tobacco does not reduce your risk of
cancer. But stopping certainly reduces the risk.
Tobacco is the major cause of oral cancer but certainly not the only cause. Their
are other causes like poor oral hygiene, chronic trauma from sharp
tooth or an ill fitting dentures. Their are other agents like some viruses which
are thought to cause or expedite the effect of tobacco in causing oral cancer.
Their are many factors like genetic make of the person, his diet and many
unknown factors that increases or decreases the susceptibility of person
of having oral cancer. But one thing is certain that tobacco consumption
increases your susceptibility by almost 8 times. That means a person consuming
tobacco is more prone to have oral cancer or other tobacco related problems.
Anybody consuming tobacco is susceptible to oral cancer. Differences in
genetics have not been identified in relation to risk and survival. That means a
Caucasian or a mongoloid, Black race all are equally prone to oral cancer if
they consume tobacco.
It depends on whether you continue your habit or not. If you stop your habit
then your chances of getting oral cancer decreases drastically. But it is always
better to get your precancerous lesion checked by a Dentist. He will suggest you
the best thing for you and may be he will take a biopsy sample of the lesion for
histo-pathological check up. Or he may apply some specific Dyes to the lesion so
that check its neoplastic potential..
Diagnosis is established by many ways like applying dyes like Toluidine
blue which may give false positive results in inflammatory lesion but never
false negative, using X rays and scans to see the extension of the lesion and
the bony involvement and the most confirmatory test is biopsy of the lesion and
its histo-pathological examination
Treatment is surgery, and in advanced cases
surgery followed by radiation therapy is done. But even that is not always
successful as 70% of the cases after treatment leads to relapse and the result
is death. The treatment is successful only if the lesion is diagnosed early, but
sadly many times, it is ignored and the patient reports when the lesion has
spread so much that the treatment is impossible or even if done the long term
prognosis is poor
Cost
involved is approximately Rs 350,000/- . The cost may vary because of many
things like the extent of the lesion, any metastasis and many other factors.
Tobacco has many chemicals which can cause cancer and lower intake doesn't
mean less susceptibility. If a person is genetically more predisposed then even
little consumption can trigger malignancy.
Cancer is very well treated with fewer complication in early stages. So if a
doctor has said that your friend has cancer than don't neglect it. If you don't
believe get it checked from an authority. Remember time is an essence here. Even
if their is slight delay the prognosis rapidly goes from good to bad to worse.
Biopsy is the only confirmatory test of whether you have oral cancer or
not. If your Dentist has recommended a biopsy he has given you the right advise.
Go ahead and do it at once without any delay.
I am not an authority on ayurvedic medicine. But it has been generally noted
that ayurvedic medicines don't work once you have oral cancer and you have to
undergo surgery. So don't wait, get the surgery done at once. May be if the
lesion has not progressed you will have a excellent prognosis.
No! You can never have oral cancer with any dental procedure performed by
your Dentist. The predominant sign of alveolar and gingival carcinoma is mobile
tooth/teeth, and only after extraction when the socket doesn't heal and their is
some growth, you find out that the tooth/teeth were mobile because of cancer.
This is a case of misdiagnosis and not wrong treatment. This type of diagnosis
can be missed even by the best of Dentist. Usually such cases give a history of
tobacco consumption.
