Alterations in Nuclear Morphometric and Distribution Parameters Spells Malignant Potentiality of Oral Leukoplakia
摘要
Evaluation of the dysplastic changes of Oral Potentially Malignant Disorders (OPMDs) like Oral Leukoplakia (OL) is pivotal for the early detection as well as prevention of oral carcinogenesis. Conventional qualitative approach suffers from predictive dubiousness due to lack of precision. Therefore, extensive research acumen in quantitative analysis is required. The present study aims to have a quantitative insight of altered nuclear-morphometric and distributional parameters in cases of OL The current study focuses on spatial distribution along with various nucleomorphometric parameters of oral epithelial layer to assess different dysplastic degrees of OL. Histologically confirmed Leukoplakia without Dysplasia (LWOD), Leukoplakia with Dysplasia (LWD) and normal submucosal (NORM) tissue samples were procured and stained with Hematoxylin and Eosin stain. Morphometric analysis of nuclei was done by ImageJ v1.53k software to quantify geometric alterations in these three study groups. Spatial distances among the nuclei of different dysplastic stages of leukoplakia were found to be significantly higher than that of normal tissue. In addition, the result also depicted statistically significant quantitative alterations of morphometric and architectural parameters in three (3) different tissue nuclei. The investigation showed significant alteration of mean distance between nuclei (nearest neighbor distance) of different groups along with substantial changes in nuclear area, perimeter, circularity and solidity in dysplastic tissues. Whereas changes in aspect ratio and roundness showed insignificant results. The present study aims to bring a precise value addition to the conventional qualitative approach regarding the early evaluation of dysplastic progression and malignant potentiality prediction of oral carcinoma.