The association between perioral injury and mucoceles

Because the origin of perioral mucous extravasation cysts (mucoceles) has been associated with injury to the glandular apparatus in the lips and cheeks it was decided to compare two groups of subjects, the one group having a known history of violent and antisocial behaviour and the other not. 474 institutionalized reform school boys and 532 randomly selected boys from state schools were examined. 48.9% of the reform boys and 2.8% of the state school pupils (p less than 0.0001) had oral scars. Mucoceles were observed in 8.2% of reform boys and 0.8% of state school boys (p less than 0.0001), the former being the highest prevalence of mucoceles reported as yet in man. 60% of the cases with mucoceles could relate the advent of the mucocele to an injury, and a significant relationship exists between the occurrence of mucoceles and the presence of oral scars (p less than 0.001). The study strongly suggests a direct relationship between oral injury and the origin of mucoceles.