Intraoral sebaceous hyperplasia: Diagnostic criteria

Abstract

Surprisingly little is understood about the physiologic and pathologic processes that involve intraoral sebaceous glands. Neoplasms are rare. Hyperplasia of these glands is undoubtedly more common, but criteria for the diagnosis of intraoral sebaceous hyperplasia have not been established. These lesions are too often misdiagnosed as large “Fordyce granules” or, when very large, as sebaceous adenomas. On the basis of a series of 31 nonneoplastic sebaceous lesions and on published data, the following definition is proposed: intraoral sebaceous hyperplasia occurs when a lesion, judged clinically to be a distinct abnormality that requires biopsy for diagnosis or confirmation of clinical impression, has histologic features of one or more well-differentiated sebaceous glands that exhibit no fewer than 15 lobules per gland. Sebaceous glands with fewer than 15 lobules that form an apparently distinct clinical lesion on the buccal mucosa are considered normal, whereas similar lesions of other intraoral sites are considered ectopic sebaceous glands. Sebaceous adenomas are less differentiated than sebaceous hyperplasia.