Analysis of clinical outcomes of patients with primary rare carcinoma of Bartholin gland: six case series report and review of the literature

BACKGROUND: Bartholin gland carcinoma (BGC) is an unusual malignancy representing less than 5% of all vulval carcinomas. Due to the limited published information on the diagnosis and treatment of BGC, this tumor is prone to misdiagnosis; most cases are found in an advanced stage once the diagnosis is delayed. METHODS: This was a retrospective study of six patients with BGC in the West China Second University Hospital between January 2011 to August 2021. RESULTS: In our study, BGC was 4.4% in all vulvar malignancies. The average age of six patients was 40.83 years old, with the tumor size ranging from 2 to 5 cm, and time of onset ranging from 2 to 3 years. Based on the retrospective clinical staging, there were three patients in stage I, one in stage II, and two in stage IVb. The human papillomavirus (HPV) 16 was detected in tissue samples of three patients. Two patients with excision of the vulvar mass and wide local excision (WLE) had local recurrence at 32 and 18 months, respectively. One patient died of distant metastasis of tumor, one died of non-tumor cause, and the others survived to this day. CONCLUSIONS: Six patients with BGC were reviewed in this study, and their characteristics of baseline information, clinicopathology, treatment approaches, and prognosis were described and analyzed, hoping to provide new insights for the diagnosis or treatment in this rare malignancy.