What are the symptoms of mouth cancer?

Hi everyone. Thank you for joining us today for our first Bupa Dental Bitesize session.

Today, we're gonna be filling in the gaps to your all-important dental queries, providing you with the wisdom to help keep your dental care on track.

So today I'm joined by Susie Lloyd, who’s a practising dentist at Bupa Dental Care. And we're going to be having a conversation today around all things oral cancer.

So, Susie, first question: What do we actually mean by oral cancer?

So, most people have heard of, obviously, cancer affecting different parts of the body, like lung cancer, prostate cancer, breast cancer. But cancer can also affect every different area of the mouth. We refer to that as oral cancer or mouth cancer. And that's where a tumour develops in the mouth. It could be on the tongue, it could be on the roof of the mouth, for example the palate, it can be on the inside of the cheeks, it could be on the lips or the gums.

Tumours can also develop in the glands, the salivary glands, which are situated all around the mouth, the tonsils at the back of the mouth and at the throat, where it connects the mouth of your windpipe, known as the pharynx. These, however, are less common types of cancer.

Nine out of ten types of cancer that develop in the mouth are actually the flat, skin like cells on the inside of the mouth. And they're called squamous cell carcinomas.

And how many people does oral cancer affect here in the UK?

So currently in the UK, it affects about 8,300 are diagnosed every year, and that's about 1 in 50 of the cancers that are diagnosed. But unfortunately, about 2,300 of people in the UK that are diagnosed with mouth cancer die every year. And what's really sad about that is that the majority of those, or many of those, can actually be prevented if that was diagnosed earlier. And at the moment, people with mouth cancer in the UK are far more likely to die of those kinds of cancers versus other kind of cancers, just mainly because there's a lack of general awareness about them. So that's why we're here today, to talk about raising awareness of those symptoms of oral cancer so that people can be detected earlier.

And are there some people who are at more risk of or susceptible to getting oral cancer?

Yes, unfortunately, anyone that has a mouth and an oral cavity can unfortunately get cancer, whether they have their own teeth or not. But men and people over 40 are more susceptible. But we have seen from research recently that mouth cancer is also becoming more common in younger age groups and also in women. And the number of new cases of mouth cancer is on the increase and it's increased by over half in the last decade, which is a little bit concerning.

Yeah, that's really interesting, I didn't know it increased so much. Particularly interesting that is more prevalent in men.

What do they say causes mouth cancer?

So there's several well-established sort of causal reasons. Alcohol is a very well-known one and also tobacco. So any kinds of smoking or chewing of tobacco. And if both alcohol and tobacco are taken together, that further increases your risk of developing an oral mouth cancer.

And the reason for that, is that alcohol makes the skin on the inside of your mouth more susceptible to basically accepting the carcinogens within cigarettes. So that's why that link is there. Things like overexposure to sunlight can also cause or increase the risk of cancer of the lips.

And more recently human papilloma virus, or HPV, has been linked as the main cause of cervical cancer but can also affect the skin that lines the moist areas of the body. So HPV can be spread, for example, through oral sex. And research now suggests that HPV could soon rival smoking and drinking as one of the major causes of mouth cancer. But the good news there is that there are things you can do to help yourself. So things like practising safe sex, and also I would mention that HPV is a causative factor and there is a link there, but it doesn't necessarily follow that if you develop human papilloma virus you will necessarily develop oral cancer. And happily there are now vaccines for HPV available for both boys and girls and they were developed mainly to fight cervical cancer, but it's likely that they're going to help reduce the risk of oral cancer as well. And those vaccines tend to be given to the 12 to 13 age group before sexual activity starts.

What are the sorts of symptoms that we need to look out for?

The most common symptoms of mouth cancer are sore ulcers that don't heal within two to three weeks, red or white patches on the lining of the inside of the mouth which are common, that can sometimes develop into cancer, unexplained persistent lumps in the mouth that don't go away or also unexplained persistent lumps in the glands in the neck, for example here, that don't go away. Things like pain and difficulty swallowing, changes in the voice or problems with speech, difficulty moving and opening your jaw, bleeding or numbness in the mouth and then things like one or more of the teeth suddenly becoming quite mobile and wobbly, or an extraction socket that doesn't heal following extraction of the teeth. Those things in conjunction with unintended weight loss or unintentional weight loss would be cause for concern and definitely need checking out.

And how important is it to tackle these signs early and how quickly should we act?

So early detection usually leads to better outcomes. So that's why it's really important to visit the dentist so we can help spot those signs really early. Your dentist, whether you're aware of it or not, will be having a very, very thorough check of exactly what's going on within the head and neck, both externally and internally, within the mouth. And even if you're feeling scared or anxious, embarrassed about visiting the dentist, please don't put it off because there's a chance that we could spot something early that might be very beneficial to you.

Thank you. And thanks so much for joining us today.