Does chewing your lips/mouth cause cancer?

[Guinastasia]

After reading this thread…

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?postid=1681659
Okay, ever since I was a kid, I’ve had a bad habit of chewing on my lips unconsciously while concentrating on something (reading, watching tv, etc etc), and I usually wouldn’t notice until I had a pretty nasty sore on my lip or the inside of my mouth. It would get really really painful for a few days-couldn’t eat anything acidic, brushing my teeth was extreme torture-but eventually it would go away.

Well, when I talked about this with my dentist a couple years ago, he said that doing this repeatedly could cause severe tissue damage, infection, which could potentially lead to oral cancer. Now, I don’t know if he was just trying to scare the bejesus out of me to get me to stop such a disgusting habit, but since then I’ve made a big effort NOT to do so-if I notice myself starting to bite my lips, I stop and lick the spot with my tongue to heal the spot.(This is getting a bit TMI, I know, but who doesn’t lick their own gums or teeth?)

So, was he putting me on, trying to scare me into stopping, or was he serious?

[bibliophage]

I don’t know if this is relevant, but some oral cancers are apparently caused by viruses. According to the story, it has only been linked to tumors that start in the tonsils or the base of the tongue, not the lips. http://www.canoe.ca/Health0005/02_cancer.html

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

Well, my grandma always told me this, too, and evidently the theory is that repeated damage of skin cells can sometimes cause a cancer to get started there. The most obvious example is skin cancer from too much ultraviolet, which damages the skin cells so they start reproducing weirdly. However, I can’t find a cite for “chewing your lip all the time will give you cancer, so stop it”.

Do you use tobacco? Tobacco users are more likely to get oral cancers, of the lip and mouth.

http://www.upci.upmc.edu/internet/occ/cancer/risk.html

Tobacco use–smoking cigarettes, cigars, or pipes; chewing tobacco; or dipping snuff–accounts for 80 to 90 percent of oral cancers. A number of studies have shown that cigar and pipe smokers have the same risk as cigarette smokers. Studies indicate that smokeless tobacco users are at particular risk of developing oral cancer. For long-time users, the risk is much greater, making the use of snuff or chewing tobacco among young people a special concern

Another risk factor for oral cancer is “caustic substances”, which means chewing things like betel nut.

http://www.oralcancer.org/public.dir/causticsub.html

CAUSTIC SUBSTANCES AND ORAL CANCER
(information provided by the Oral Health Education Foundation reference source: Oral Cancer, by Sol Silverman, Jr. MA, DDS, third edition, published by the American Cancer Society)

In different parts of the world a variety of substances are introduced into the mouth, and some of these substances may increase the risk for oral cancer. For example, slaked lime, betel nuts and various spices are placed in the mouth in countries such as India, and the incidence of oral cancer is particularly high in this country. In fact, in Asia oropharyngeal cancer is the leading cancer in men, and in Africa and Asia oropharyngeal cancer is the third most frequent cancer site in women.

And then there’s this:
http://www.upci.upmc.edu/internet/occ/cancer/risk.html

Some studies have shown that many people who develop oral cancer have a history of leukoplakia, a whitish patch inside the mouth. The causes of leukoplakia are not well understood, but it is commonly associated with heavy use of tobacco and alcohol. The condition often occurs in irritated areas, such as the gums and mouth lining of smokeless tobacco users and the lower lip of pipe smokers.

Another condition, erythroplakia, appears as a red patch in the mouth. Erythroplakia occurs most often in people 60 to 70 years of age. Early diagnosis and treatment of leukoplakia and erythroplakia are important because cancer may develop in these patches.

http://www.adha.org/oralhealth/oralcancer.htm

Warning Signs

• A mouth sore that bleeds easily or fails to heal
• A lump, thickening or soreness in the mouth, throat or tongue
• Soreness or swelling that doesn’t go away
• A white or red patch in the mouth that doesn’t go away
• Difficulty in chewing, swallowing or moving your tongue or jaw.

This may have been what your dentist was concerned about. If you always have sores in your mouth, how will you know if one of them is cancer? I doubt if he was trying to scare the bejesus out of you “…just because”.

It IS his job, after all.

[Mangetout]

I can’t find a cite for it, but a doctor friend of mine told me once that anything that causes irritation can potentially lead to an increased risk of cancer, basically, her logic was that irritation or injury requires increased cell-division in order to heal, and that cancer can be caused by something going wrong at the point of cell division (she wasn’t nearly as vague as this), don’t know how much basis in fact that has, just my 2c.

[Guinastasia]

Chew? ICKY!!!

I don’t get sores on my mouth from anything other than that.

And yes, the sores do get white/yellow as they heal, but that’s only like a wet scabby thing-god this is gross.

for the record, I’m doing much better. They do heal, it just takes a couple of days, and it hurts like a bitch in the meantime.

[butter_pie]

I think you’re doing it wrong. I’ve been a serious lip-biter my whole life, but I’ve never done it in such a way that it caused that kind of damage. I have had my lip bleed a couple of times in the last few months, because when I had my wisdom teeth out about a year ago they damaged the nerves in my face and I have no feeling on the lower-left portion of my lip and chin. That means I don’t really feel how hard I am biting it, so I’ve made a stronger effort to go a easier on it. One thing that helps me is wearing lipstick. Lipstick on your teeth looks ridiculous, and that’s enough of a subconcious deterrent to keep me from biting them most of the day.

That, or try becoming a lip gloss/Chapstick addict. It’s very difficult to bite/chew on your lip if it’s excessively slippery.

Just don’t get the flavoured stuff. Biiiiig mistake!