Association Between Cytological and Histopathological Diagnoses of Neoplastic and Non-Neoplastic Lesions in Oral Cavity from Dogs and Cats: An Observational Retrospective Study of 103 Cases.

Cytology is an exam frequently used as a diagnostic technique to evaluate animal oral lesions. However, the retrospective studies published comparing cytology and histology in oral pathology are scarce. This study aimed to determining the association between diagnostic cytology and histopathology in neoplastic and non-neoplastic samples from oral cavity lesions of dogs and cats. Cytological and histological samples ( = 103) of oral lesions from 70 dogs and 33 cats collected over 12 years were compared in terms of agreement, considering the histopathology as the gold standard. Of 103 specimens, 78 were classified as neoplastic, and 25 were non-neoplastic. The sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of cytology in neoplastic and non-neoplastic lesions were 84.6%, 96.0%, and 87.4%. Of the overall 103 cases, 75.7% ( = 78) were neoplastic and revealed an agreement that was complete in 64.1% ( = 50) and partial in 17.9% ( = 14) samples, and the remaining 17.9% ( = 14) revealed disagreement; regarding the non-neoplastic diagnoses (24.3%, = 25) the agreement was complete in 68.0% ( = 17), partial for 20.0% ( = 5) samples, and the remaining 12.0% ( = 3) revealed disagreement. A statistical association between neoplastic cases and agreement was obtained ( < 0.0001). The high agreement verified between the cytological and histopathological diagnoses emphasizes the role of cytology as the first approach method to an oral lesion in dogs and cats.