What is oral cancer? How do you prevent it? What causes it, and are you at risk? According to the American Cancer Society it affects over 35,000 men and women. Oral cancer has many warning signs, but the most common symptoms are : a growth or sore that does not go away, and includes the lips, tongue and cheeks, unexplained swelling, bleeding, eroding tissue, red or white patches appearing, a chronic sore throat and weight loss, but many times at the early stages, there are no signs or symptoms at all . There are lots of risk factors on contracting this disease, but remember a quarter of all cases do not fall into any of these categories. A major factor is smokers and excessive drinkers, snd they are six times as likely to get this type of cancer, and smokeless tobacco users are fifty times as likely. If caught in the early stages there is a significantly higher chance that you can make a full recovery, but sometimes there Here at Kamy Dental we have been working to change those unnoticed early stages with a new tool known as Velscope, which is a light that detects oral tissue abnormalities and is done at every cleaning and exam appointment. This procedure is non invasive and the latest at oral cancer prevention and diagnosis.