Be alert to early symptoms of oral cancer

Oral cancer is a malignant tumor. The characteristics of this tumor are that it deteriorates rapidly, progresses rapidly, and has a short course. The patient's early symptoms are relatively not obvious, so it is very important to understand some signs. For example, if you often experience oral pain, plaques or ulcers on the oral mucosa, or if some lumps of tissue occur, you should be alert.

1. Pain

Early oral squamous cell carcinoma is generally painless or only causes paresthesia or slight tenderness. Obvious pain only occurs when a lump or ulcer occurs, but the pain is not as severe as inflammation. If you have pain or tongue pain, you should carefully check the painful area for nodules, lumps and ulcers. If the painful area has the above signs, you should highly suspect cancer in that area.

2. Plaque

When oral squamous cell carcinoma is located superficially, it may appear as superficial infiltrating plaques, which are difficult to differentiate from leukoplakia or hyperplastic erythema without a biopsy.

3. Ulcers

Oral squamous cell carcinoma often causes ulcers, which are typically manifested as a hard, irregularly raised, and unevenly shaped infiltrated mass with the ulcer surface extending to the entire tumor area.

4. Lump

Oral squamous cell carcinoma originates from the oral mucosal epithelium, and its tumor is formed by the proliferation of squamous epithelium. Regardless of whether it breaks out into the oral cavity to form ulcers or infiltrates deeper into the body, the lumps formed are relatively superficial and cancerous tissue lesions can always be seen on the mucosa. In addition, oral cancer often metastasizes to nearby cervical lymph nodes first. Sometimes the primary lesion is very small, and the symptoms are not even obvious, but the cervical lymph nodes have already metastasized and become larger. Therefore, if swollen lymph nodes in the neck suddenly occur, the oral area should also be carefully examined.