Objective: To study main clinical characteristics of patients with vulvar intraepithelial neoplasia 3 (VIN3). To investigate the long-term outcome and risk factors associated with recurrence or progression to invasive carcinoma.
Patients and methods: Retrospective study of 56 patients with VIN3 from January 1st 1995 to December 31st 2003.
Results: Lesions were unifocal for 30 patients (53.6%) whereas they were multifocal for 26 patients (46.4%). When the lesion was multifocal, women were younger than in the unifocal group (41.2+/-16.7 vs. 52.5+/-13.5 years, P<0.03). Clinical symptoms, disease characteristics and medical history were not different between the two groups. Clinical HPV infections were more frequent in the multifocal group (65.4 vs. 23.3%, P<0.01). The mean follow-up was 39 months. Nine patients (16.1%) had recurrence of VIN3. Progression to invasive carcinoma occurred in 4 patients (7.1%). Multifocal lesions, occult micro-invasive disease and positive margins were related to recurrence or progression to invasive carcinoma. However, age at diagnosis, HPV infection, lichen sclerosis, immunosuppression and initial treatment did not correlate with evolution.
Discussion and conclusion: Recurrence and progression to invasive carcinoma can occur during VIN3 evolution. Our results confirm previous reports and suggest that all patients need a long-term follow-up regardless of patients' age or clinical characteristics.