Deletions on the short arm of chromosome 3 have been demonstrated in many human cancers, including sporadic and hereditary renal cell, small cell lung, non-small cell lung, cervix, and breast carcinomas, suggesting several putative tumor suppressive genes on chromosome 3p. In head and neck squamous cell carcinomas(HNSCC), deletions at 3p have been reported to lietelomeric to 3p14 and centromeric to 3p25. Polymerase chain reaction(PCR)-based restriction fragment length polymorphism(RFLP) analysis of DNA samples of normal control group(n=40) and HNSCC group(n=21) was performed to investigate the possibility of chromosome 3p deletions at the THRB, D3F14S2 and peripheral blood DNA specimens of normal control group(n=40) ; 21(52.5%) at THRB locus on 3p24, 5(12.5%) at D3F15S2 locus on 3p21 and 13(32.5%) at D3S2 locus on 3p14.2-p21. The constitutional heterozygosity in the normal pheripheral blood DNA specimens of HNSCC group(n=21) were as follows : 10(47.6%) at the THRB locus, O(0%) at the D3F15S2 locus, 8(38.1%) at the D3S2 locus. In 21 matched tumor DNA specimens, loss of heterozygosity was observed in 2 of 10(20.0%) at the THRB locus and in 1 of 8 cases(12.5%) at the D3S2 locus. These results demonstrate that there might be a genetic difference in the allelic ratio of D3F15S2 locus between Koreans and Westerns and that deletion of chromosome 3p is a less frequent abnormality in head and neck squamous cell carcinomas in Koreans than in Westerns. Further restriction fragment length polymorphism study on the other polymorphic loci including THRB and D3S2 would be necessary to determine th role of 3p deletions in the pathogenesis of head and neck squamous cell carcinomas in Koreans.