Clinicopathological risk factors for local recurrence in oral squamous cell carcinoma

Local recurrence of oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) after primary surgery has been considered to be a poor prognostic entity in terms of survival rate. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the incidence of local recurrence and to identify significant risk factors for the local recurrence in OSCC. The authors retrospectively reviewed records for 187 patients who underwent radical surgery for OSCC. The local recurrence rate was 16.0% (30/187 patients) in this study. The survival rate of patients with local recurrence was 33.3%, which was significantly lower than that (94.3%) of patients without local recurrence. Pattern of invasion (POI), neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC), and the status of the surgical margin were identified as factors influencing local recurrence. In particular, NAC and the status of the surgical margin were independent risk factors by multivariate analysis. The deep margin was resected at a close site in many NAC-treated patients, suggesting that NAC may lead to local recurrence and poor outcomes. No efficacy of NAC was observed, suggesting that the standard treatment of oral cancers is surgery alone.