Under the National Programme for Prevention and Control of Non-Communicable Diseases, screening for oral cancer at the Health and Wellness Centre level is done by which method?

• A Toluidine blue vital staining of the oral mucosa
• B Exfoliative cytology of oral scrapings
• C Salivary biomarker panel for p53 mutation
• D Visual inspection of the oral cavity for precancerous lesions ✓

Explanation

The programme recommends opportunistic visual inspection of the oral cavity by trained health workers for all individuals above 30 years attending the facility, looking for leukoplakia, erythroplakia, submucous fibrosis or non-healing ulcers. Suspicious lesions are referred to the District Hospital for biopsy confirmation. Toluidine blue and exfoliative cytology are adjunct tools used at higher centres, not the community screening method.

Reference: Park's Textbook of Preventive and Social Medicine, 27th ed.

High-yield for: NEET PGINI-CETNExTFMGEUSMLEPLABMRCP

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