A sneak peep at adenoid /acantholytic variant of oral squamous cell carcinoma

Troduction Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) as known to all is the most common intraoral malignancy affecting the Asian population. As the pathologists encounter this malignancy most often it becomes easier to diagnose this neoplasm most of the times. But at times, it does not show typical features of conventional OSCC but shows some variations in its patterns. This makes the diagnosis of this neoplasm tricky one and also it changes the prognosis of the lesion. There are many variants of OSCC which includes Verrucous carcinoma, Basaloid OSCC, Acantholytic/Adenoid OSCC, Papillary OSCC, Spindle cell OSCC, Clear cell OSCC and Signet cell OSCC.1 Not much is known about all these variants of OSCC as very few cases are reported in our literature; but these variants certainly warrants attention as these can cause misdiagnosis of the malignancy and also the biological behavior and prognosis of the particular variant is different from conventional squamous cell carcinoma.