Karyotypic findings in tumors of the vulva and vagina

Neoplasms of the vulva and vagina together account for less than 5% of all female genital tract cancers, and very few cases have been analyzed using c hromosome banding techniques. We report the karyotypic findings in a consec utive series of ten tumors of the vulva and vagina; in addition to five squ amous cell carcinomas of the vulva, we present the first cytogenetic analys is of two malignant melanomas and a Paget disease of the vulva, as well as an adenocarcinoma and a squamous cell hyperplasia of the vagina. Whereas no clonal karyotypic changes were found in the squamous cell hyperplasia of t he vagina, the remaining nine malignant tumors showed clonal chromosome abn ormalities. An inverse cor relation was found between the degree of histolo gic differentiation and karyotypic complexity in the squamous cell carcinom as of the vulva. The malignant melanomas had chromosomal aberrations that h ave previously been described in malignant melanomas occurring elsewhere, b ur were less karyotypically complex. Cytogenetically unrelated clones were defected in the Paget disease of the vulva but not in any of the of her tum ors; this finding is consonant with the interpretation that at least a prop ortion of Paget disease of the vulva arises multicentrically within the epi dermis from pluripotent stem cells. (C) Elsevier Science Inc., 1999. All ri ghts reserved.