AgNOR as a Proliferative Marker in the Diagnosis of Oral Cancer

Tumor grading and typing has an important role in evalution and assessing the management of tumor both clinically and also the prognosis. Even though histopathological diagnosis is golden standard, but some times the pathology picture fail to differentiate between benign or malignant tumors. To overcome this shortfall, the study was designed to use buccal smears for diagnosis which is less cost effective, well tolerated by the patients and can be repeated any number of times. So the present study aimed at evaluating the proliferative index of the oral epithelial cells taken from a buccal smear in three different groups namely normal subjects, smoker and tobacco chewers using AgNOR staining.