If you or someone you love is at elevated risk of oral cancer, it’s important to understand how oral cancer screenings work, why they can be so beneficial, and how to go about getting one. We often see patients for exactly this type of screening in our Hampstead, NC dental office, and we’re here to walk you through early oral cancer screenings: what they are, why they’re so important, and how to get one.
The Importance of Early Oral Cancer Screenings: Warnings from a Hampstead, NC Dentist
Why Diagnose Cancer Early?
Cancer is a progressive disease, which means that it develops from Stage I cancer, where the cancer is localized to a specific area and is easily treated, to Stage IV cancer, where the cancer has slipped into the blood stream and set up additional tumors or cancerous growths in other parts of the body, a process known as metastasis. Cancer is much easier to treat before it’s metastasized, and outcomes are almost always better for patients diagnosed in early-stage cancer as opposed to later stages of the disease.
The sooner oral cancer is diagnosed, the greater the chance that cancer growth can be taken care of and the better outcome treatments can have. Early diagnosis is crucial in saving lives and reducing the need for invasive or complex surgeries, and maintaining normal mouth function after entering remission. In short, everything from diagnosis to recovery gets easier when cancer is caught sooner, which makes oral cancer screening a health care imperative.
What Is My Oral Health Professional Looking For?
When a dentist or other oral health professional peers into a patient’s mouth for a cancer screening, they’re looking for more than just the obvious. The goal of a screening for oral cancer is to detect cancer as early as possible, while the signs are at their subtlest. Mouth cancer can occur on the lips, gums, or tongue, not to mention the roof and floor of the mouth or the inner linings of the cheeks.
Oral cancers usually present with small sores, white patches (known as leukoplakia), or other areas of irritation. Your dentist will look for anything that seems unusual and, depending on what they find, make a plan for further diagnosis. That may include advanced images, using a fiber optic camera to get a better inspection in your mouth or throat, and/or taking biopsies in order to send tissue samples to the lab for analysis.
Am I at Risk for Oral Cancer?
There are a number of risk factors that increase the likelihood of cancer development. Oral cancer is almost twice as likely to occur in men as it is in women, for example. Age is also a factor, but not a deciding one; while most oral cancers occur in patients over the age of 64, a full 20% of cases occur in people younger than 55. That means that even if you’re not approaching senior citizenship anytime soon, it’s still a good idea to get screened regularly.
Risks of oral cancer increase in smokers and tobacco chewers, in those who frequently consume alcohol, and in those with family members who have had oral cancer or who have previously had oral cancer themselves. For reasons that aren’t clear, obesity also increases risk of oral cancer, along with those who have previously had an infection of human papillomavirus (HPV).
Can I Get Mouth Cancer If I’ve Never Smoked?
Unfortunately, oral cancer does not only affect tobacco users. Cancer is a mutagenic phenomenon, meaning that it occurs as the result of an error during cell division in the stage when DNA gets copied. The copied DNA isn’t always perfect, even in a healthy person; the copies often contain errors or damage to the genetic code, known as mutations. While most mutations don’t cause cancer, some do.
The role tobacco and alcohol play in cancer formation is that they both cause damage to the DNA in replicating cells and an increase in DNA replication errors, a property called mutagenesis. These simply amplify the rate at which these errors occur. So while tobacco users and those who overindulge in alcohol are at a greater risk of oral cancer, it does occur in those who have never used tobacco products or rarely imbibe.
What Happens If I Get Oral Cancer?
If a patient develops sores in the mouth that turn out to be cancerous or precancerous lesions, there are a number of treatment options that may be appropriate, depending on how advanced the cancer is when it is diagnosed. You may have one type of treatment, or you may undergo a combination of treatment modalities to mitigate your particular cancer. Here are a few ways doctors intervene:
Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy is a term that often sounds scary but simply refers to any number of drugs that preferentially attack cancer cells as opposed to healthy ones. Cancer care is an evolving art, with new chemotherapy drugs hitting the market frequently, each with their own profile of risks and benefits.
Radiation
Depending on the location and type of cancer, you may be a candidate for radiation therapy, which uses targeted blasts of X-rays and protons to attack tumors with minimal damage to the surrounding healthy tissue. Radiation might be used on its own in early-stage cancer or might be used in combination with chemotherapy or surgical approaches in more advanced cases. Each patient and each case is different.
Surgery
In some cases, surgery may be necessary. Smaller cancers can be removed with minor surgery, some even on an outpatient basis, while larger tumors might necessitate removing a more substantial amount of tissue. The approach will depend on how advanced the cancer is, particularly whether it’s spread to the neck, and whether or other modalities like chemotherapy and radiation are appropriate and helpful.
In the most extreme cases, your surgeon might need to remove part of the tongue or jaw in order to save your life. These surgeries can have life-altering implications, and many require one or more separate procedures to reconstruct the mouth or throat. However, early diagnosis and rapid treatment can drastically reduce the chances that you will need a radical, life-altering operation to beat your cancer.
What Can I Do To Reduce My Risk?
While some factors, such as your genetics or your age, aren’t alterable, most oral cancer risk factors are linked to behavior, behavior you have the power to change. One of the single best health interventions you can engage in is to stop using tobacco in any form altogether. Choosing to moderate or even eliminate your consumption of alcohol also has a profound effect not just on your oral health, but on your health overall.
Engaging in good oral hygiene is also a good idea. Brushing your teeth twice per day, flossing daily, and, if needed, using an antiseptic mouthwash can help maintain good oral health, making it easier to tell if a lesion or sore is cropping up. Lastly, getting your oral health screened every year as part of a dental check-up is an excellent way to help make sure your mouth stays as healthy as possible.
Ready to give your mouth the check-up it deserves at a dental office who serves your community with gentle, compassionate care? Book your oral cancer screening at Smith Family & Cosmetic Dentistry in Hamsptead NC, with locations serving Sneads Ferry, Goldsboro, Jacksonville, Surf City, and Porters Neck, NC.