Oral Cancer Screening at Workplace in India-One-year Follow-up

Oral cancer remains the commonest form of cancer and cancer-related deaths among Indian males due to popularity of avoidable risk factors such as tobacco and alcohol use. A workplace oral cancer screening and tobacco cessation study was commenced on World No Tobacco Day 2007 at a chemical industry in rural Maharashtra.

The objectives were to screen the employees for oral neoplasia and to correlate it with their tobacco consumption pattern. In addition, the objective was to provide tobacco cessation services at the workplace.

This is an interventional cohort study among 104 employees of a chemical industrial unit in rural Maharashtra. Naked eye examination of the oral cavity was performed for all employees by a doctor irrespective of the tobacco habits at the beginning and at the end of 1 year. In between, the tobacco users were regularly examined during each follow-up.

Through personal interviews of the participants, data were manually recorded and were transferred to electronic data base. Data analysis was conducted in STATA™ 8.2 on intention to treat basis.

Among the 104 employees, 50 (48.08%) were current tobacco users at the beginning of the program. Oral precancers were seen exclusively among 20 (40%) tobacco users. After 1 year of workplace tobacco cessation intervention, 80% of oral precancers regressed. This shows that screening of the oral cavity at the workplace is effective when combined with tobacco cessation.