What is Oral Cancer?
What is Oral Cancer?
This booklet deals with cancer of the lips, oral cavity and the oropharynx, but not cancer of the salivary glands, hypopharynx and nasopharynx.
Over 90% of oral cancers are squamous cell carcinomas and the intra-oral sites affected show common risk factors. These sites are amenable to detection by physical inspection of the mouth and oropharynx. Using WHO International Classification of Disease (ICD), Version 10 (ICD-10), the sites covered in this booklet comprise the lip (ICD-10, C00), the tongue (ICD-10, C01, C02), gum (ICD-10, C03), floor of the mouth (ICD-10, C04), palate (ICD-10, C05), other unspecified parts of the mouth (ICD-10, C06), tonsil (ICD-10, C09), oropharynx (ICD-10, C10), and other ill-defined sites (ICD-10, C14).
Over 90% of oral cancers are squamous cell carcinomas.