0:00
Hello, my name is Giuseppe Ficarra,
and I'm the Director
of the Reference Center
for the Study
of Oral Diseases in Florence.
The topic of this talk is about
the potential lethal mouth disease,
which include premalignancy
and oral cancer.
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Oral cancer is the most common
tumors of the head and neck area.
The diagnostic delay of this tumor
often results in fatal outcome.
In western countries,
the incidence is decreasing,
whereas we know that in East Europe
and South East Asia,
it is increasing instead.
This trend has implications
related to the use of tobacco,
alcohol, and betel quid.
GLOBOCAN which is a project
from the International Association
of Cancer Research,
it tabulates or estimates that in 2012,
there were worldwide
more than 300,000
cases of cancer of the oral cavity
and over 142,000
cases of the oropharynx.
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Since the last decade,
we are getting new
epidemiological evidence
on a new type of cancer
of a viral origin,
which arises
from oropharynx and tonsils.
The responsible viral agent
is human papillomavirus,
mainly HPV-16,
which is transmitted
through orogenital contacts.
In the last few years,
a dramatic increase has been reported
mainly in North America, Australia,
and parts of Europe.
