CLINICOPATHOLOGICAL SPECTRUM OF BENIGN ORAL CAVITY LESIONS

Background:Oral lesions can closely resemble one another and hence it is important for the clinicians to be able to recognize the various conditions and if possible obtain a biopsy for a confirmatory pathological diagnosis.

Aim:To study the type of common benign lesions of the oral mucosa and to evaluate the concordance of clinical and histopathological diagnosis.

Materials And Methods:A retrospective study was carried out in a tertiary care hospital in South Bangalore during the period of two years from June 2016 to May 2018. The study included 50 cases of benign lesions of the oral cavity. The following parameters were analyzed age and sex distribution of the lesion, site of the lesion, clinical presentation and histopathological diagnosis. Data collected were analyzed.

Results:Among the 50 cases, the age ranged from 6 to 70 years with a mean of 30.3 years. Most of the patients were females (68%) in their 3^rd decade. The sites of involvement of various lesions were labial mucosa with lower lip more commoner than upper lip, followed by tongue, buccal mucosa and maxillary alveolus. The various clinical diagnosis of the lesions were mucus retention cyst, papilloma and pyogenic granuloma. Excision biopsy of these lesions confirmed most cases of mucus retention cyst, pyogenic granuloma and few cases of papilloma on histopathological examination. Rest of the cases were extravastion cyst, fibromyxoma, actinomycosis, lobular capillary hemangioma, hamartoma, angiolymphoid hyperplasia with eosinophils and keratosis without atypia.

Conclusion:Benign lesions of the oral cavity mimic each other. Histopathological typing of the lesions is mandatory to rule out malignancy and for a definitive and a confirmatory diagnosis.