ABSTRACT
Introduction: Oral cancer is a serious problem worldwide. It is sometimes preceded by clinically visible lesions which are called precancerous lesions, and usually culminate in development of oral cancers. Oral malignancies lay a huge burden on the patients, socially as well as economically. Community intervention programs along with involvement if dental health professionals could play a huge role in limitation of the oral malignancies. Aims and objectives: To find out the prevalence of oral potentially malignant disorders in Aligarh, and its association with age and gender. Methods: Community based Cross sectional descriptive study was performed using a pretested questionnaire in a sample of 1078 participant .Systematic Random Sampling was used and the data analysis was done using SPSS24. Results: 25.3% of the participants were found to have clinical features of Oral Potentially Malignant Disorders (OPMD), overall prevalence of OPMD was 19.1% in study participants, more prevalent in age group 46-55 years (28.9%), and in males (33.5%) as compared to females (7.8%). Conclusion and Recommendations: Community intervention programs, and Government aided programs should be put in place to curb this very important public health problem. The role of dental health professionals in motivating the population to limit the consumption of tobacco and tobacco containing products also cannot be undermined.