Oral mucocutaneous lesions - a comparative clinicopathological and immunofluorescence study

Oral mucosa is often affected by many diseases including mucocutaneous disorders. The diagnoses of these disorders are primarily based on history, clinical features, and histopathology. For the past few years' immunofluorescence techniques emerged as an important tool to study the pathogenesis and in the diagnosis of oral mucocutaneous and vesiculobullous disorders. The present study was designed to carry out retrospective and prospective analysis of oral mucocutaneous lesions to elucidate the clinicopathologic features and its immunofluorescence findings.

A total of 70 subjects with oral mucocutaneous lesions were retrieved from the oral pathology files of Tamil Nadu Govt. Dental College and their clinical features were evaluated, and the histopathology was also evaluated with the help of hematoxylin and eosin stained sections. For the prospective study, biopsy from 12 subjects with oral mucocutaneous lesions was subjected to routine histopathological examination and DIF to evaluate the consistency of the methods.

In the retrospective analysis of 70 subjects with oral mucocutaneous lesions in relation to clinical features and histopathology, most of the findings were similar to the previous studies except for few criteria like male predilection in lichen planus and mucous membrane pemphigoid (MMP) and more prevalence of pemphigus vulgaris than MMP (2:1). In the prospective analysis of 12 subjects, the histopathological diagnosis was consistent with DIF study in 66% of cases.

The diagnostic efficiency of oral mucocutaneous lesions can be improved by modern tools like DIF studies in addition to traditional methods like clinical and histopathology.