Evaluation of consistency rate between clinical and histopathological diagnosis of oral soft tissue lesions

BACKGROUND: Some of the oral lesions including malignant tumors of mesenchymal and epithelial origin have same clinical features. Most of them are white or red patches with undermined edge. Also, in some cases, the microscopic view of histopathologic examination is not diagnostic. So, the integration of clinical and pathological information leads to the correct diagnosis. The aim of this study was the evaluation of consistency rate between clinical and histopathological diagnosis of oral malignant tumors of mesenchymal and epithelial origin. METHODS: This cross-sectional retrospective study was performed in four centers of oral pathology of Hamedan University of Medical Sciences, Hamedan, Iran, during January to June, 2016. The data were collected using the archived files of patients. Collected data from the files included age, sex, lesion location, lesion type, and first and second clinical and histopathologic diagnosis. Finally, histopathological findings were compared with the first and second clinical diagnosis. Data were analyzed using SPSS software. RESULTS: Ninety-one and seventy-nine of studied files were related to men and women, respectively. Most frequent malignant lesion was related to squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) (52.9%), followed by melanoma (29.4%). The consistency rate of first and second clinical and histopathologic diagnosis was 68.2% and 15.2%, respectively. Higher consistency rate was observed in melanoma, SCC, and fibrosarcoma lesions. CONCLUSION: High inconsistency rate between clinical and histopathological diagnosis was found in some cases which may have originated from low diagnostic knowledge of clinicians or their misconception from misdiagnosis. Therefore, the improvement of knowledge and awareness of clinicians by conducting retraining courses is necessary.