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Background: Head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) is one of the most common cancers. Chemotherapy remains one dominant therapeutic strategy, while a substantial proportion of patients may develop chemotherapeutic resistance; therefore, it is particularly significant to identify the patients who could achieve maximum benefits from chemotherapy. Presently, four pyroptosis genes are reported to correlate with the chemotherapeutic response or prognosis of HNSCC, while no study has assessed the combinatorial predicting efficacy of these four genes. Hence, this study aims to evaluate the predictive value of a multi-gene pyroptosis model regarding the prognosis and chemotherapeutic responsiveness in HNSCC. Methods: By utilizing RNA-sequencing data from The Cancer Genome Atlas database and the Gene Expression Omnibus database, the pyroptosis-related gene score (PRGscore) was computed for each HNSCC sample by performing a Gene Set Variation Analysis (GSVA) based on four genes (Caspase-1, Caspase-3, Gasdermin D, Gasdermin E). The prognostic significance of the PRGscore was assessed through Cox regression and Kaplan–Meier survival analyses. Additionally, chemotherapy sensitivity stratified by high and low PRGscore was examined to determine the potential association between pyroptosis activity and chemosensitivity. Furthermore, chemotherapy sensitivity assays were conducted in HNSCC cell lines in vitro. Results: As a result, our study successfully formulated a PRGscore reflective of pyroptotic activity in HNSCC. Higher PRGscore correlates with worse prognosis. However, patients with higher PRGscore were remarkably more responsive to chemotherapy. In agreement, chemotherapy sensitivity tests on HNSCC cell lines indicated a positive association between overall pyroptosis levels and chemosensitivity to cisplatin and 5-fluorouracil; in addition, patients with higher PRGscore may benefit from the immunotherapy. Overall, our study suggests that HNSCC patients with higher PRGscore, though may have a less favorable prognosis, chemotherapy and immunotherapy may exhibit better benefits in this population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Oral lichen planus, a chronic inflammatory immune disease, occurs in the oral mucosa. We aimed to assess the prevalence and possible influencing factors of oral lichen planus in patients with diabetes mellitus. Subjects and Methods: This cross‐sectional study involved 525 patients with diabetes mellitus and 525 controls. We collected information on blood glucose level, duration of diabetes, diabetic complications, treatment methods, other systemic diseases and medication history. Results: Oral lichen planus was significantly more prevalent in the diabetes mellitus/type 2 diabetes mellitus group than in the controls (2.3%/2.2% vs. 0.6%, p = 0.019/0.022). There was no significant association between patients with diabetes mellitus with and those without oral lichen planus in age (p = 0.195), sex (p = 0.390), blood glucose level (p = 1), duration of diabetes (p = 0.638), diabetic complications (p = 1), treatment methods (p = 0.962), other systemic diseases (p = 0.891) and medication history (p = 0.848). Conclusions: Diabetes mellitus was associated with oral lichen planus; there was a higher prevalence of oral lichen planus in patients with diabetes mellitus/type 2 diabetes mellitus than in those without diabetes. Oral lichen planus development in patients with diabetes mellitus was not significantly associated with age, sex, blood glucose level, duration of diabetes, diabetic complications, treatment methods, other systemic diseases and medication history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To examine the comparative efficacy and safety of topical administration for oral lichen planus. Materials and Methods: An electronic database search (1st January 1946 to 1st May 2020) for randomised controlled trials identified 34 studies involving eight interventions (clobetasol, betamethasone, triamcinolone, dexamethasone, fluocinolone, tacrolimus, pimecrolimus, and cyclosporine); these studies were subjected to network meta‐analysis using direct and indirect comparisons [efficacy indicators: clinical response rate, symptom‐reducing effect (visual analogue scale score), sign‐reducing effect (Thongprasom‐scale score) and relapse; safety indicator: adverse event occurrence]. Results: Compared with placebo, tacrolimus had the best clinical response rate (odds ratio (OR), 57.78 [95% CI 3.15–1060.52]; P–score, 0.8654) and cyclosporine had the worst (OR, 3.61[95% CI 0.20–66.62]; P–score, 0.2236); tacrolimus had the best symptom‐reducing effect (standardised mean difference (SMD), 1.06 [95% CI 0.41–1.71]; P–score, 0.9323) and fluocinolone had the worst (SMD, −0.54 [95% CI −1.44–0.36]; P–score, 0.0157); dexamethasone had the best sign‐reducing effect (SMD, 3.60 [95% CI 1.74–5.45]; P–score, 0.8306) and clobetasol had the worst (SMD, 2.63 [95% CI 1.66–3.61]; P–score, 0.2581); and pimecrolimus performed best (OR, 0.04 [95% CI 0.00–0.64]; P–score, 0.9227) and clobetasol performed the worst [OR, 0.60; 95% CI 0.15–2.45; P–score, 0.2545] in reducing relapse. Regarding safety, dexamethasone was the safest compared with placebo [OR, 0.37; 95% CI 0.05–2.57; P–score, 0.9337), whereas fluocinolone ranked low for safety [OR, 9.48; 95% CI 1.50– 60.03; P–score, 0.1189]. Conclusions: The relative ranking of topical administration varies according to the different indicators. Based on the joint consideration of clinical response rate and adverse event occurrence, dexamethasone, triamcinolone and betamethasone are recommended for better efficacy and safety. The optimal treatment for oral lichen patients varies under different conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To investigate the association between oral lichen planu(OLP) and anxiety. Subjects and Methods: This study included 174 OLP patients and 174 healthy controls. We assessed anxiety by Self‐rating Anxiety Scale (SAS) and recorded OLP lesion type and severity. t test and analysis of variance were applied for continuous variants and chi‐square test was performed for categorical variants. Multiple linear regression and logistic regression analysis were used for multi‐variable analysis. Results: he SAS score of OLP patients was higher than that of healthy individuals. There was no significant difference in SAS score between the OLP subgroups, obtained according to age, type, and severity, respectively. Multiple linear regression analysis showed gender was the only factor that affected the SAS score of OLP patients. Compared with weakly anxiety‐related groups, the SAS score and female ratio of highly anxiety‐related group were obviously higher. Logistic regression analysis demonstrated that males were less exposed to highly anxiety‐related types than females. Conclusions: OLP patients tend to be more anxious compared with healthy individuals, and female patients are more anxious than male patients. There might be two types of OLP patients: weakly anxiety‐related or highly anxiety‐related. These results highlight the significance of psychological counseling in OLP disease management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

: To evaluate the application of medical magnifying loupes in diagnosis of oral mucosal diseases. Twenty-four patients with plaque-type oral lichen planus or homogeneous oral leukoplakia were inspected by naked eyes or assistance with magnifying loupes. Histopathological results were used as the gold standard to evaluate the sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of the two methods in clinical diagnosis. Questionnaires were used to evaluate the subjective effect of magnifying loupes on the diagnosis efficiency of oral mucosal diseases and to explore the most suitable parameters for application. The sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of medical magnifying loupes for the identification of plaque-type oral lichen planus and homogeneous oral leukoplakia were 94.74%, 100.00% and 95.83%, respectively, which were significantly higher than those of naked eye inspection (89.47%, 80.00% and 87.50%). The effective rate of magnifying loupes assisted diagnosis was 91.76% according to physicians' subjective evaluation. The most suitable parameters were 3.5 times magnification and working distance. The medical magnifying loupes can effectively improve the efficiency of the inspection and diagnosis of oral mucosal diseases, and have the characteristics of convenience and real-time. The recommended clinical parameters are 3.5 times magnification and working distance.