Current treatments of vulvar cancer

Vulvar cancers are rare genital tumors. Their etiology is better understood. The management of these tumors has benefitted from recent therapeutic advances that decrease the morbidity of the treatments. Surgery is still the major curative option. But the limitation of the vulvar resections and the development of the sentinel-node technique have led to lower surgical morbidity and sequellas without increasing the risk of recurrence. Also improvements in radiotherapeutic treatment have been observed. Currently radiotherapy is realized in association with surgery in case of presence of risk factors of recurrence, or in place of surgery when this treatment is not possible or is too much aggressive. Morbidity of radiotherapy has largely decreased and association with chemotherapy leads probably to increased efficacy. (c) 2012 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.