Abstract
In a 1997 Editorial in the Pakistan Journal of Otolaryngology.1
I wrote, under that title, on the then emerging
role of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery (OMFS) specialization in Pakistan noting, with a degree of pride, the
beneficial introductory addition of the expertise of the dento-facial specialist surgeon to the then existing
group of Head and Neck surgical specialties.
Oral cancer, already acknowledged in the late eighties as the second most common non-gender specific
cancer after lung cancer- both tobacco related and largely preventable- was rising. 1
It noted that the
majority of patients seen at the OMFS and ENT Units at Dow Medical / Civil Hospital, Karachi, presented late
requiring heroic, always painfully mutilating, and even in the mileu of the public sector hospitals, financially
draining and often pointless, surgical procedures; or as often happened, were rejected as already beyond
salvage. Evidence based introduction of selective rather than routine radical neck dissections and the
advent of microvascular anastomosed free flaps, still mainly limited to a few private sector institutions
Evidence based introduction of selective rather than routine radical neck dissections and the advent of
microvascular anastomosed free flaps, still mainly limited to a few private sector institutions, has done much
to improve the quality of care and reduce the morbidity of this terrible disease.
Dr. Mervyn Hosein. (2018) Can We Do Better Than Just Scratching At The Surface Of Unending Misery 2?, The Pakistan Journal of Medicine and Dentistry, Volume-7, Issue-1.
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