Session Item

While exploring histopathological high-risk factors for squamous cell carcinoma of oral cavity most studies have included mixed population of oral cavity subsites such as oral tongue, buccal mucosa, retromolar trigone, gingivo-buccal sulcus, floor of mouth, hard palate and alveolus. Oral tongue have different natural history and hence may behave differently from other sites with regard to high-risk pathological factors. The objective of this study was to explore inter-correlations between various pathological high-risk factors found in resected specimen of OTSCC. 

It was a retrospective analysis in which we reviewed the final histopathology of surgical specimen of 202 patients with OTSCC who had undergone upfront surgical resection followed by adjuvant therapy. Inter-correlations were performed between various pathological factors using Spearman’s correlation test. Factors assessed were pathological T stage, pathological nodal stage (N Stage), lymphovascular invasion (LVI), perineural invasion (PNI), depth of invasion (DOI), tumour thickness (TT), worst pattern of invasion (WPOI), and extranodal extension (ENE).

Various inter-correlation between factors found are shown in Table.

pT stage has significant positive correlation with pN stage, DOI, PNI, TT and ENE. pN stage has significant positive correlation with PNI, LVI, TT, WPOI and ENE. Grade has significant correlation with WPOI. PNI has significant correlation with DOI, LVI, TT, WPOI and ENE. LVI has significant correlation with pT stage, DOI, PNI, TT, WPOI and ENE. DOI has significant correlation with pT stage, PNI and TT. TT has significant correlation with pT stage, DOI, PNI, LVI, WPOI and ENE. WPOI has significant correlation with pT stage, pN stage, DOI, PNI and LVI. ENE has significant correlation with pT stage, pN stage, PNI and LVI. Many of these correlations are not shown in most other studies on oral cancer.