Oral Cancer Screening

Our dentist performs oral cancer screening to look for all the signs of cancer or precancerous conditions in your mouth. It intends to identify mouth cancer at an early stage so that cancer can be cured and treated on time.

When you visit our clinic for a dental check-up, we include oral cancer screening as a part of the check-up. Apart from routine dental examinations, we may also perform additional tests to identify and diagnose the problem.

What Causes Oral Cancer?

Oral cancer can be caused because of many reasons. Some of the most common factors that make you prone to developing the disease include excessive use of tobacco in cigarettes, pipes, chewing raw tobacco, heavy use of alcohol, history of sun exposure, and others. Today, the number of patients getting diagnosed with oral cancer is also associated with sexually transmitted infection, human papillomavirus, or HPV.

What Happens During Oral Cancer Screening?

Visual Examination

We will carry out a visual examination to check anything odd or abnormal inside your mouth. If you wear dentures or other dental appliances, we will ask you to remove them before performing visual screening. We will check for the swellings, bumps, asymmetries, ulcerations, patches of colors, and other abnormalities in your mouth. Alongside this, we will also observe your lips, face, jaw, neck, cheeks, oral cavity, and the inside of your nose.

Physical Examination

Apart from a visual examination, we may also perform a physical examination by touching your mouth, neck, and face to find unusual masses or nodules. A tactile inspection through physical examination helps us find the presence of hard lumps in your skin.

What are the Oral Cancer Screening Devices?

The physical or visual examination that we perform includes the use of specialized examination tools to help us carry out screening properly. We use an oral brush biopsy to painlessly remove your cells and send them for testing. An oral assessment system tool including a fluorescent light is used to find the presence of suspicious oral tissues in your mouth. We also carry out oral lesion screening using a mouth rinse during visual inspection.

What Happens After Oral Cancer Screening?

If we find nothing abnormal during your oral examination, it’s good news. But if we detect something doubtful, we may recommend further tests, and after diagnosing the problem, we will suggest an appointment with the oncologist to start the treatment at the earliest.

Please reach out to our dental practice in Flanders, NJ, to have a consultation with our dentists. Please call us at (973) 370-8917 or schedule an online consultation, and we'll guide you further.