Diagnosis of oral ulcerative lesions might be quite challenging. This narrative review article aims to introduce an updated decision tree for diagnosing oral ulcerative lesions on the basis of their diagnostic features. Various general search engines and specialized databases including PubMed, PubMed Central, Medline Plus, EBSCO, Science Direct, Scopus, Embase, and authenticated textbooks were used to find relevant topics by means of MeSH keywords such as “oral ulcer,” “stomatitis,” and “mouth diseases.” Thereafter, English-language articles published since 1983 to 2015 in both medical and dental journals including reviews, meta-analyses, original papers, and case reports were appraised. Upon compilation of the relevant data, oral ulcerative lesions were categorized into three major groups: acute, chronic, and recurrent ulcers and into five subgroups: solitary acute, multiple acute, solitary chronic, multiple chronic, and solitary/multiple recurrent, based on the number and duration of lesions. In total, 29 entities were organized in the form of a decision tree in order to help clinicians establish a logical diagnosis by stepwise progression.

Diagnosis of oral white lesions might be quite challenging. This review article aimed to introduce a decision tree for oral white lesions according to their clinical features. General search engines and specialized databases including PubMed, PubMed Central, EBSCO, Science Direct, Scopus, Embase, and authenticated textbooks were used to find relevant topics by means of MeSH keywords such as “mouth disease”, “oral keratosis”, “oral leukokeratosis”, and “oral leukoplakia”. Related English-language articles published since 2000 to 2017, including reviews, meta-analyses, and original papers (randomized or nonrandomized clinical trials; prospective or retrospective cohort studies), case reports, and case series about oral diseases were appraised. Upon compilation of data, oral white lesions were categorized into two major groups according to their nature of development: Congenital or acquired lesions and four subgroups: Lesions which can be scraped off or not and lesions with the special pattern or not. In total, more than 20 entities were organized in the form of a decision tree in order to help clinicians establish a logical diagnosis by a stepwise progression method.

In this study, we formulate a new proposal that complements previous classifications in order to assist dental practitioners in performing a differential diagnosis based on patients' radiographs. We used general search engines and specialized databases such as Google Scholar, PubMed, PubMed Central, MedLine Plus, Science Direct, Scopus, and well-recognized textbooks to find relevant studies by using keywords such as "jaw disease," "jaw lesions," "radiolucent rim," "radiolucent border," and "radiolucent halo." More than 200 articles were found, of which 70 were broadly relevant to the topic. We ultimately included 50 articles that were closely related to the topic of interest. When the relevant data were compiled, the following eight lesions were identified as having a radiolucent rim: periapical cemento-osseous dysplasia, focal cemento-osseous dysplasia, florid cemento-osseous dysplasia, cemento-ossifying fibroma, osteoid osteoma, osteoblastoma, odontoma, and cementoblastoma. We propose a novel subcategory, jaw lesions with a radiolucent rim, which includes eight entities. The implementation of this new category can help improve the diagnoses that dental practitioners make based on patients' radiographs.

Diagnosis of peripheral oral exophytic lesions might be quite challenging. This review article aimed to introduce a decision tree for oral exophytic lesions according to their clinical features. General search engines and specialized databases including PubMed, PubMed Central, Medline Plus, EBSCO, Science Direct, Scopus, Embase, and authenticated textbooks were used to find relevant topics by means of keywords such as “oral soft tissue lesion,” “oral tumor like lesion,” “oral mucosal enlargement,” and “oral exophytic lesion.” Related English-language articles published since 1988 to 2016 in both medical and dental journals were appraised. Upon compilation of data, peripheral oral exophytic lesions were categorized into two major groups according to their surface texture: smooth (mesenchymal or nonsquamous epithelium-originated) and rough (squamous epithelium-originated). Lesions with smooth surface were also categorized into three subgroups according to their general frequency: reactive hyperplastic lesions/inflammatory hyperplasia, salivary gland lesions (nonneoplastic and neoplastic), and mesenchymal lesions (benign and malignant neoplasms). In addition, lesions with rough surface were summarized in six more common lesions. In total, 29 entities were organized in the form of a decision tree in order to help clinicians establish a logical diagnosis by a stepwise progression method.

The health and suitability of mouth components play an important role towards defining facial attractiveness. An important component of the oral cavity is the color of the gingival tissue. Gingival melanin hyperpigmentation is caused by several reasons and affects people across ethnicity, race, age, and both gender. Lasers are presently being used for gingival melanin depigmentation. In this article, we reviewed studies on laser parameters, duration of gingival healing, pain perception during and after the operation, scores used for the evaluation of gingival melanin hyperpigmentation, follow-up period, treatment results, and recurrence reports. We conclude that laser ablation for gingival depigmentation is one of the most pleasant, reliable, acceptable, and impressive techniques available for treating gingival melanin hyperpigmentation.