Color Doppler Ultrasonography in Mapping Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Background: although color doppler ultrasonography (cdus) is useful in thediagnosis of various diseases of the head and neck, flow signals in oral malignant massesare less studied; hence the present study assesses the usefulness of color doppler ultrasonographyin quantifying oral squamous cell carcinoma (oscc) vascularization. inaddition, we determine the hemodynamic parameters by spectral analysis obtained duringa color doppler ultrasonography procedure. we have studied the usefulness of colordoppler ultrasonography in mapping oral squamous cell carcinoma of the buccalmucosa, tongue and lip.methods: this case-control study enrolled 60 subjects aged 20-70 years. group aconstituted 30 cases diagnosed with oral squamous cell carcinoma and group bconstituted 30 healthy controls. ultrasonographic investigation of each mass wasperformed. the spectral waveform (time-velocity doppler spectrum) of the flowsignal was analyzed for the pulsatility index, resistive index, peak systolic velocity(m/sec), and end diastolic velocity (m/sec). all patients had real-time, gray-scalesonography and color doppler ultrasonography with spectral wave analysis.results: the mean value for the resistive index in patients with oral squamous cellcarcinoma was 0.40±0.14 whereas for healthy subjects, it was 0.83±0.07. the meanpulsatility index value in malignant patients was 0.86±0.20 while for healthy subjects,it came-out to be 2.61±0.77.conclusion: these doppler indices have been shown to be sensitive and specificfor the diagnosis of malignant oral tumors. although color doppler ultrasonographycannot replace histopathological procedures, it plays a definite role as an adjunct toclinical evaluation of oral squamous cell carcinoma patients.