Alcohol, smoking and oral cancer. A 10-year retrospective study at Base Hospital, Yaba.

This paper is an attempt to document alcohol and smoking habits as risk factors in the aetiology of oral cancer. A retrospective survey of patients who presented with oral cancer at Base Hospital, Yaba (BHY) for 10 years (1987 - 1996) was carried out. Fifty eight patients were surveyed excluding those with incomplete data. There were 40 male (66%) and 18 female (33 1/3%) giving a M:F ratio of 2:1. There were 50% of the patients who were referred by hospitals and clinics, while the remaining 50% were self-referred. The maximum number of male patients with oral cancer occurred at 65-70 year age range while the corresponding figures for female was 50-60 years. A significant number of our patients, 40%, lived in rural areas and most of them presented with poor oral hygiene, oral sepsis, decayed and( missing teeth. It was noted that most of these were relations of military personnel. In the biopsy report, the most frequently diagnosed was squamos cell carcinoma, 84.6% of the total, however 7.1% of lymphoma, and 3.5% each of adenocystic carcinoma and odontogenic carcinoma were made. A case of melanoma was also recorded. From the study, alcohol consumption is a more implicated factor in the aetiology of oral cancer than tobacco, especially in patients with highest cancer incidence in floor of mouth, tongue and buccal mucosa (52.5% of cases). This perhaps shows that alcohol and tobacco has site specificity in the aetiology of oral cancer.