Oral Cancer Staging and Clinicopathologic Features Presenting to Oral & Maxillofacial Surgery Practice in Saudi Arabia

The most common type of head and neck cancer, oral cancer (OC), is the 16th most common malignancy and the 15th most frequent cause of cancer-related deaths in the world. There has been an increase in the incidence of OC in Saudi Arabia in recent years. The survival rate of oral cancer is one of the lowest in the world and still, unfortunately, a large number of OC cases are discovered in advanced stages. The purpose of this study is to assess the prevalence of advanced stages of oral cancer in maxillofacial surgical oncology practice in Saudi Arabia. Patients diagnosed with oral cancer presented to the oral and maxillofacial surgery clinic at 2 institutions where the author's work was identified. Primary data extracted from the database included age, sex, histologic subtype, tumor site, and TNM stage. A total of 156 records of patients with oral cancer confirmed by histopathology were assessed. The mean age of patients was 59.2 years. The majority of the patient presented at an advanced stage, 79% with a distribution as follows: 11% Stage I, 10% Stage II, 16% Stage II, and 63% Stage IV. The positive nodal disease was diagnosed in 58% of the tumors. The study reflects the high prevalence of advanced oral cancer cases in Saudi Arabia as experienced by an oral and maxillofacial surgery practice and it highlights the need for more collaboration between the centers to ensure timely diagnosis and referral of oral cancer patients.