Prevalence of Oral Lichen Planus and Assessment of Factors Associated with It- A Retrospective Study

Abstract

Lichen planus is a chronic inflammatory mucocutaneous disease that evolves in outbreaks, affecting the skin,
mucous membranes or both. It is a recurrent disease. Etiology of lichen planus include anxiety, diabetes,
autoimmune diseases, mainly chronic liver disease, intestinal diseases, increased cholesterol, medications,
stress, hypertension, infections, contact with dental materials, cancer and a genetic predisposition to cancer.
It mainly affects the middle aged and the elderly, with a predominance in females in a ratio of 2:1. The
aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of Lichen planus assessment of factors associated with
it. A retrospective study was conducted in the Saveetha Dental College, Chennai, India. Ethical clearance
was obtained from SRB committee, Saveetha Dental College, Chennai, India. The clinical portion of this
retrospective study was conducted over a 9 month period,i.e, between June, 2019 to March,2020. Some
patients reported with pain while for others it was observed during routine examination. Data was collected
from a total of 86000 patients who visited Saveetha dental college between Jun,2019 to March,2020. Out
of this, the data of 99 patients who visited the institute were retrieved. The data obtained was tabulated in
SPSS for windows, version 20. Descriptive statistics were analysed. Chi square test was done to analyse
correlation. Data Analysis in the present study revealed that oral lichen planus was more predominant in
females. It was more predominant between 50-59 years of age. The erosive variety of oral lichen planus
was more predominant, most commonly affects the buccal mucosa and diabetes was the most predominant
systemic disease in these patients. The association was found to be statistically significant between clinical
variants of oral lichen planus and age (P=0.000) and gender (P=0.000). However, association was not found
to be statistically significant between clinical variants of oral lichen planus and area affected (P=0.146),
dental status (P=0.795) and systemic diseases (P=0.602).