Surgical treatment for 11 cases of penile verrucous carcinoma

Abstract

Penile verrucous carcinoma is a rare, well-differentiated and low-grade tumor. The surgeons are deficiently aware about the biological behavior and the clinicopathological characteristic of this disease, which raises difficulties during the treatment. In our present study, the clinical and pathological data of 11 patients with penile verrucous carcinoma, aged between 49 to 85 years was retrospectively analyzed. The tumors exhibited exophytic, papillary, caulifower-like or verrucose lesions of great dimensions measuring between 2 to 10 cm on the penises. The tumors were located at glans in 6 cases, invaded the coronoid sulcus in 4 cases and invaded the shaft of the penis in 1 case. Eight cases underwent partial penectomy, while the other 3 were treated with local excision. The diagnosis of penile verrucous carcinoma was confirmed by histopathologic examination of the specimens with the negative surgical margins in all the cases. Within the period of 12 to 60 months of follow-up, all the patients were disease-free with no case of recurrence and metastasis. The novel knowledge and experience of the treatment of penile verrucous carcinoma will be a useful clinical guide for surgeons in the future.

Keywords: Penis; Surgery; Verrucous carcinoma.

Fig. 1

The morphologies and invading site of penile verrucous carcinoma. The exophytic tumor of the glans penis invading the coronoid sulcus is shown in (A) from the patient No. 7 in the Table 1. The exophytic tumor located at glans is shown in (B) from the patient No. 6 in the Table 1.

Fig. 2

Verrucous carcinoma (H&E, ×100). Verrucous carcinoma showing hyperkeratosis, parakeratosis, acanthosis with bulbous downward projections into the dermis and well-differentiated tumor cells.