[Toluidine blue solution as a diagnostic aid in oropharyngeal cancer]

In the literature exist investigations made to extensive series of patients, with premalignant oral lesions or suspicious of malignancy, in which it has been employed toluidine blue (TB), to verify the trustiness of this method as a resource for support in clinical diagnosis. The results are favourable whenever is observed the correct realization of the technique that must be preceded by a careful buccal exploration and that both findings be corroborated. This work tries to exemplificate one of the techniques of TB as will as the results obtained in 28 patients, whom, for their characteristics were considered of High Risk. Emphasis is made in relation to the false positive found. Besides, is insisted in the convenience of the routine use of this resource in the odontologic private practice and at institutional level in patients over 50 years old, to whom is necessary to accomplish at a time an adequate patient history and an accurate intraoral examination, that in addition to the use of TB, will make feasible to detect more cases of malignant lesions in early stages.