title: Oral leukoplakia - an update.
abstract: The main purpose of this paper was to assess the current state of science on oral leukoplakia. Although it is considered a potentially malignant disorder the overall malignant progression of oral leukoplakia is of the order of 5% and even more. Nowadays there are no currently accepted markers to distinguish those that may progress to cancer from those that may not. The current golden standard is considered the presence of epithelial dysplasia on the tissue biopsy of the lesion. Proliferative verrucous leukoplakia is a rare form of OL which has multiple recurrences, is refractory to treatment and has malignant transformation in a short period. It is considered a true premalignant lesion. The management of oral leukoplakia varies from a "wait and see" attitude and topical chemopreventive agents to complete surgical removal.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Dentistry, "Carol Davila" University of Medicine and Pharmacy Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Ioanina
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Parlatescu
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Dentistry, "Carol Davila" University of Medicine and Pharmacy Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Carmen
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Gheorghe
authors.affiliation: Committee of Public Health of the Senate, Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Elena
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Coculescu
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Dentistry, "Carol Davila" University of Medicine and Pharmacy Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Serban
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tovaru
keywords: oral leukoplakia; potentially malignant disorder