GLOSSITIS RHOMBICA MEDIANA; ROLE OF THE SALIVA.

For the last ten years we have been studying a number of patients presenting abnormal findings of the oral mucosa. We have studied patients with allergic stomatitis provoked by the material used in their dentures (amalgams or local therapeutic applications, tooth paste and other local causes); and also patients with membrane conditions not reacting to skin tests with these materials. From these latter cases we have isolated a small group of rhombic median glossitis. The classic texts give very precise descriptions of this painful affliction: it has an insidious onset with moderate functional manifestations (burn, difficulty in speaking), which little by little increase in intensity, followed by local V-shaped depapillation in the median line of the dorsal surface (Fig. 1).