Oral Cancer Screening in Oakland, NJ

Laser Dentistry of North Jersey is pleased to offer comprehensive dental care for the whole family. We perform oral cancer screening for every patient who comes in for hygiene appointment. Oral cancer screening in our office is done with a VELscope technology.

DR. BUCHER: Oral cancer screening in our office is done with a VELscope. It is a light, and when I look through it and I scope a patient’s mouth, it takes about two minutes. We use it for every patient that comes in for hygiene appointments, and it shows us areas that are not visible to the naked eye that have had changes in the tissue that are suspect for oral cancer, at which point we can use a brush biopsy here in the office, or if it’s more extensive than that, we can refer them to an oral surgeon. The benefit of using the technology to do that is the fact that, currently, the five-year survival rate for oral cancer is about 50%, because it is detected so late by the time it’s visually detectable in the mouth. With this method, we can detect it when it looks like there’s nothing there, and we can address it much earlier, and ideally have a better outcome for the patient where surgery can be less debilitating and their survival rate should hopefully be better. It gives patients great piece of mind to know that, even though they can’t see anything, we can check for oral cancer, and we can tell them that there really isn’t anything there that we can see. It’s time well spent, because it only takes two minutes to do, but it’s something that, getting back to the whole comprehensive part of treating a patient, it’s one of the few things we could do that could truly save somebody’s life.