Everything is ready for the 18th edition of Oral Cancer Day, in which the Andi provincial section of Terni will also participate.
The event will take place on Saturday 11 May in Piazza San Francesco from 10am to 7pm, when Andi’s dentists will raise awareness among citizens of oral cancer and will carry out free check-ups on citizens, assisted as every year by the Misericordia di Terni association .
Since 2018, the Andi section of Terni has been actively promoting the awareness campaign on oral cancer in the area, recording important numbers. Last year, more than 200 screenings were carried out, allowing the identification of some suspicious cases and thus allowing the citizens involved to investigate any problems in time in the relevant office.
“This year too we will be in the square – explains Andrea Raggi, cultural secretary of Andi Umbria and Terni – to evaluate the presence of cancerous or pre-cancerous lesions of the oral cavity. This type of pathology is easily detectable with a simple visit, in an initial state of the disease. In this way we can save lives and we can ensure that the following surgical and pharmacological steps are less invasive.”
Oral cancer, if detected and treated in its initial stages, allows a recovery ranging from 75% to 100% of cases, with minimally invasive therapeutic interventions. Unfortunately, due to an underestimation of the risk combined with few preventive checks (especially in some social groups of the population), over half of the cases are diagnosed in a locally advanced or already metastatic stage.
How to recognize the signs of the presence of carcinoma? In its initial stage, oral cancer frequently presents through pre-cancerous lesions such as white and/or red spots or plaques, small erosions or ulcers inside the mouth. Dangerously underestimated, these initial pathological conditions are often labeled by patients as “inflammation”. Silent anomalies, which do not present symptoms, are persistent and do not resolve spontaneously or with common therapies. For this reason, undergoing timely and periodic screening, carried out by a specialist, is essential to understand whether the lesion is a non-evolutionary pathology or whether it represents the initial stage of a real tumor. Normally, then, if the suspicious lesions persist beyond 10-15 days, it is necessary to resort to diagnostic investigations such as biopsy and, in any case, a second level evaluation at specialized reference centers.
