Survival Analysis of Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma in a Subgroup of Young Patients

Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is predominantly a disease of middle-aged men with long-termexposure to tobacco and alcohol. An increasing trend has been reported at a younger age worldwide. Clinicalrecords of 100 patients under the age of 45 years treated specifically for oral cavity SCC in our hospital duringa 10-year period were retrospectively analyzed to calculate the survival rates. An obvious male predominancecoincided with smoking trend among Chinese young individuals and female patients were more likely to have notraditional risk factors such as smoking or drinking. The 5-year overall survival rate and disease-free survival ratewere 61.0% and 75.5%, respectively, consistent with other published series over the decade showing a relativelybetter survival among the young. No significant differences clearly correlated with outcome when comparingnon-smokers non-drinkers to ever-smokers and ever drinkers (P>0.05). Overall survival rate and disease freesurvival rate was found to be significantly higher in patients with early-stage disease than with advanced stagedisease (P=0.001, P=0.009 respectively). The strong influence of clinical stage on prognosis emphasizes theimportance of early diagnosis and treatment of oral malignancies for this unique clinical subgroup.