Surgical ablation, intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT), chemotherapy, and immunotherapy remain the frontline weapons against oral and oropharyngeal malignancies.
However, the aggressive nature of cancer therapies often leaves survivors with profound functional, anatomical, and psychosocial sequelae.
Post-treatment sequelae—including severe oral mucositis, radiation caries, osteoradionecrosis, xerostomia, dysphagia, and loss of occlusal stability—can severely compromise a patient’s nutritional intake and quality of life.
Historically, dental intervention in oncology was largely restricted to reactive tooth extractions prior to radiation.
Today, supportive care has evolved into an active, multidisciplinary discipline where timely dental and oral surgery interventions directly influence overall cancer survival and treatment timelines.
In the comprehensive narrative review "Oral Health Management and Rehabilitation for Patients with Oral Cancer: A Narrative Review," published in Healthcare (MDPI), authors Yuhei Matsuda, Ruwan D. Jayasinghe, Hui Zhong, Shinichi Arakawa, and Takahiro Kanno provide an essential clinical framework that integrates oral health management across every phase of cancer care.
By categorizing protocols into oral hygiene management, oral function management, and dynamic postoperative prosthetic rehabilitation, this paper outlines a standardized roadmap for dental clinicians working within oncologic teams.
► PDF: Digital Dentistry Solutions: Overcoming Bimaxillary Flabby Ridges in Complete Denture Rehabilitation
Key Scientific & Clinical Highlights Covered
✔ Pre-Therapeutic Oral Hygiene Protocols: Strategies for stabilizing periodontal conditions, addressing carious lesions, and eliminating oral infectious foci prior to surgery or radiotherapy to mitigate surgical site infections and systemic sepsis.
✔ Managing Therapy-Induced Complications: Clinical countermeasures against severe oral mucositis, opportunistic fungal infections (e.g., Candida albicans), xerostomia, and the prevention of radiation caries using specialized fluoride regimes and remineralizing pastes (such as CPP–ACP).
✔ Quantitative Oral Function Assessment: Evaluating masticatory efficiency, tongue pressure, swallowing competence, and oral moisture using objective diagnostic tools (such as digital prescale sensors and tongue pressure probes) to monitor post-surgical functional deficits.
✔ Prosthetic & Maxillofacial Rehabilitation: Principles of post-resection functional reconstruction, evaluating the biomechanics of surgical obturators, implant-supported maxillofacial prostheses, and guided functional exercises to prevent trismus and restore mastication and speech.
✔ The Multidisciplinary Care Model: Highlighting the critical role of oral and maxillofacial surgeons, general dentists, dental hygienists, speech therapists, and oncologists in delivering coordinated supportive care from diagnosis through long-term survivorship.
Mastering these integrated protocols empowers dental professionals to transition from simple problem-solvers to indispensable oncologic care partners—restoring function, mitigating life-threatening complications, and giving oral cancer patients back their dignity and oral health.
📖 Ready to upgrade your supportive care protocols and master oral cancer rehabilitation?
Explore the full literature review, examine the detailed clinical assessment workflows, and download the complete open-access article in PDF format on MDPI here.
