Application of medical magnifying loupes in diagnosis of oral mucosal diseases.

: To evaluate the application of medical magnifying loupes in diagnosis of oral mucosal diseases. Twenty-four patients with plaque-type oral lichen planus or homogeneous oral leukoplakia were inspected by naked eyes or assistance with magnifying loupes. Histopathological results were used as the gold standard to evaluate the sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of the two methods in clinical diagnosis. Questionnaires were used to evaluate the subjective effect of magnifying loupes on the diagnosis efficiency of oral mucosal diseases and to explore the most suitable parameters for application. The sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of medical magnifying loupes for the identification of plaque-type oral lichen planus and homogeneous oral leukoplakia were 94.74%, 100.00% and 95.83%, respectively, which were significantly higher than those of naked eye inspection (89.47%, 80.00% and 87.50%). The effective rate of magnifying loupes assisted diagnosis was 91.76% according to physicians' subjective evaluation. The most suitable parameters were 3.5 times magnification and working distance. The medical magnifying loupes can effectively improve the efficiency of the inspection and diagnosis of oral mucosal diseases, and have the characteristics of convenience and real-time. The recommended clinical parameters are 3.5 times magnification and working distance.