Lips
- Normal lips are symmetrical, pink, smooth, and moist
- Abnormal findings include asymmetry, cyanosis, pale color, dryness, and growths or discoloration
- Diseases that can affect the lips include mucocele, aphthous ulcer, angular stomatitis, carcinoma, cleft lip, leukoplakia, herpes simplex, and chelitis
Teeth
- Healthy teeth should be clean, white, with shiny enamel, and smooth surfaces and edges
- Adults should have a total of 32 teeth, while children have 20 deciduous teeth
- Abnormal findings include missing, loose, broken, and misaligned teeth
- Diseases that can affect the teeth include baby-bottle tooth decay, epulis, meth mouth, and Hutchinson's teeth
Gums
- Healthy gums should appear symmetrical, moist, and pinkish with well-defined margins
- Dark-skinned individuals may have a melanotic line along the gum margin
- Abnormal findings include swelling, cyanosis, paleness, dryness, sponginess, bleeding, or discoloration
- Diseases that can affect the gums include leukoplakia, epulis, gingival hyperplasia, gingivitis, periodontitis, and aphthous ulcer
Oral mucosa
- Healthy oral mucosa appears moist, smooth, shiny, and pink
- Abnormal findings include dryness, cyanosis, paleness, Fordyce spots, canker sores, Koplik's spots, candidiasis, and leukoplakia
- Stensen's duct is located opposite the second molar
- Diseases that can affect the oral mucosa include canker sores, Koplik's spots, candidiasis, and leukoplakia
Hard palate
- The healthy hard palate is whitish in color, with a firm texture and irregular transverse rugae
- Abnormal findings include yellowness, extreme pallor
- Diseases that can affect the hard palate include torus palatinus, cleft palate, submucous cleft palate, high-arched palate, Kaposi's sarcoma, and leukoplakia
This article needs additional citations for verification. (July 2015) |
A mouth assessment is performed as part of a patient's health assessment. The mouth is the beginning of the digestive system and a substantial part of the respiratory tract. Before an assessment of the mouth, patient is sometimes advised to remove any dentures. The assessment begins with a dental-health questionnaire, including questions about toothache, hoarseness, dysphagia (difficulty swallowing), altered taste or a frequent sore throat, current and previous tobacco use and alcohol consumption and any sores, lesions or bleeding of the gums.