[Crohn disease of the oral cavity, illustrated by some cases].

Background: We have several times experienced that Crohn's disease has not been diagnosed until several years after the start of oral symptoms. This article presents some patients with oral manifestations of Crohn's disease, as a contribution to more awareness of this possibility.

Material And Methods: Clinical and histological data from four patients are presented.

Low vascular density indicates poor response to radiotherapy in small glottic carcinomas.

Reportedly, the high density of vessels adjacent to various tumours is associated with increased tendency to metastasis and poor prognosis. In contrast, for other cancers a high vessel density is correlated with a good response to radiation therapy, and thus a good prognosis. In this study we measured the vessel density in 53 small glottic SCC (T1N0 and T2N0), treated with radiation (66-70 Gy).

Is the carbohydrate sialosyl-Tn a marker for altered, non-malignant activity in squamous epithelium in the head and neck region?

Cell surface carbohydrates are involved in many cell functions such as cellular differentiation, adhesion, and invasion. A carbohydrate, sialosyl-Tn (STn), is expressed in many human carcinomas but generally not in normal epithelia. In the oral mucosa, however, STn has recently been observed on basal cells in some lesions with epithelial hyperplasia and dysplasia.

[Cell surface carbohydrates are involved in various biological processes].

All human cells show carbohydrate structures on the surface. New knowledge about the genetic mechanisms for the synthesis of these carbohydrates and the generation of monoclonal antibodies with high specificity shows that carbohydrates are involved in various cell-cell and cell-matrix interactions. For instance, cell surface carbohydrates seem to be important in connection with fertilization, embryonic development, cell differentiation, cancer, adhesion of microorganisms and immunological processes.

Malignancy grading of the deep invasive margins of oral squamous cell carcinomas has high prognostic value.

Several recent studies have indicated that cells at the invasive tumour margins often are different from cells within other parts of various human cancers. In this work, we have studied all squamous cell carcinomas of the floor of the mouth registered in Norway during the years 1963-1972 (N = 96). Borderline cases and cases given no treatment were excluded.