Vulvar tumors are those neoplasms of the vulva. Vulvar and vaginal neoplasms make up a small percentage (3%) of female genital cancers.[1] They can be benign or malignant (vulvar cancer).[2][3][4][5] Vulvar neoplasms are divided into cystic or solid lesions and other mixed types.[6] Vulvar cancers are those malignant neoplasms that originate from vulvar epithelium, while vulvar sarcomas develop from non-epithelial cells such as bone, cartilage, fat, muscle, blood vessels, or other connective or supportive tissue.[7] Epithelial and mesenchymal tissue are the origin of vulvar tumors.[1]
Malignant vulvar neoplasms makes up 6% of all reproductive organ cancer and 0.7% of the total cancers in women in the United States. One out of every 333 women will develop vulvar cancer. In the United States, vulvar cancer accounts for nearly 6% of cancers of the female reproductive organs and 0.7% of all cancers in women. In 2018, there were 5,496 women diagnosed with cancer of the vulva and 1,316 women who died from it.[8] Malignant vulvar tumors can develop in the inner edges of the labia majora, labia minora, clitoris or in the Bartholin glands.[9] Research in preventing vulvar cancers includes investigations into the use of oncogenes, tumor suppressor genes, drug treatments, surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, and lymph node mapping.[10]
^There are four main groups of vaginal neoplasms: benign neoplasms, in situ neoplasms, malignant neoplasms, and neoplasms of uncertain or unknown behavior. Malignant neoplasms are also simply known as cancers.Tumor (American English) or tumour (British English), Latin for swelling, one of the cardinal signs of inflammation, originally meant any form of swelling, neoplastic or not. Current English, however, both medical and non-medical, uses tumor as a synonym for a neoplasm (a solid or fluid-filled cystic lesion that may or may not be formed by an abnormal growth of neoplastic cells) that appears enlarged in size.Some neoplasms do not form a tumor; these include leukemia and most forms of carcinoma in situ. Tumor is also not synonymous with cancer. While cancer is by definition malignant, a tumor can be benign, precancerous, or malignant.
