Referred for hospital appointment by dentist because of my tongue

[littlebluedog12]

And now I'm freaking out a little! It was just a routine dentist appoimtment and I didn't even mention to her that I had a sore patch on my tongue, I just assumed it was an ulcer.

She spent a long time looking at it then showed me in the mirror how one side is red, with a couple of ulcer-type spots and a hard lump. She said 'oh it's probably just an infection and they'll probably give you some cream for it' . But she seemed quite concerned. And the thing is it's been like that for a while and I often get ulcers on that side of my mouth.

I obviously then went home and googled and convinced myself it's something terrible... Does anyone have any experience of this?!

Stop googling.. no good will come of it.

Will you be getting an appointment in the post to get it looked at?

Hi, yes she said I should get a letter in the post in the next couple of weeks. On my notes she wrote 'referral for soft tissue examination in hospital'

I had something similar, went to docs because of reoccurring ulcers & GP spotted lichen planus. It is routine to refer sufferers to hospital but anything sinister is very rare. Is it worth you calling the dentist to discuss it further if you can't stop worrying?

Keep us posted.

Thanks for posting, legoqueen that is really reassuring actually as the description of lichen planus does sound quite similar. If I don't get an appointment through within a few weeks I might just pop to the GPs to see what they say. Thank you

Go back to the dentist not the GP. They have far more training in mouth problems than us.

Ok thanks- I have a hygienist appointment in 2 weeks anyway so I can mention it then if I haven't heard anything.

Obviously you are concerned it may be cancer, because if you've been googling, that's always going to come up. That would be rare and unlikely, but it needs checking out.

You say you suffer from ulcers and tongue problems often... This can be a marker for a few things in the digestive tract, for example, coeliac disease, ulcerative colitis, crohns. So it may be worth putting google to good use and looking at the wider symptoms of those conditions and then speak to your GP if you have any concerns.

OP - if your dentist suspected cancer, you would get a referral within 2 weeks.

Thanks Rawcoconut I'll have a look. Beahive she did say I would have a referral in a couple of weeks or maybe a phonecall although she didn't mention cancer at all.

I know cancer would be rare in my age group but my mum died from throat cancer in her 40s even though she wasn't considered high risk. In fact that's part of the reason they didn't catch it sooner. So I guess that's making me a bit oversensitive about this.

Sorry, Raw, I misunderstood because you said "if I don't get a referral in a few weeks ..."

I completely understand you feeling sensitive about this as my mum also died in her 40s and they faffed about for bloody months before she was diagnosed

I've recently been on the two week referral and my GP made it clear that she wanted to rule out cancer as it was much more likely to be something easily treatable. They tend not to mess about these days. Hold onto the fact that it is unlikely to be anything serious.

Oh no, hope your referral goes ok Beahive .

After a weekend studying my tongue and pictures of other people's (not recommended!) I've decided no good will come from obsessing about it so I'm going to do my best to forget about it and wait for my appointment.

I'm not making much sense today - my last post was meant for you, littlebluedog, not Raw. And my appt was a month ago and thankfully all was well and I wish the same for you. And agree - stay away from Google