Angiomyxoma is a type of soft tissue tumor that can arise around the genitals, trunk, head, or neck. There are two types, known as aggressive and superficial, classified by their depth and behavior. This growth is usually benign, but a small number of malignant cases have been reported in medical literature. When a patient is diagnosed with angiomyxoma, a surgeon may recommend having a pathologist evaluate the growth to be certain of the diagnosis and confirm it is not cancerous.
Superficial tumors grow in the upper layers of the skin and tend to develop slowly. They may be mistaken for cysts and other kinds of masses until they are evaluated more closely by a doctor, who can take a sample for biopsy or may decide to remove the whole growth for inspection. The recommended treatment for superficial angiomyxoma is excision of the tumor and monitoring of the site to spot new growth if it recurs. Risks for patients with this kind of growth are low and it shouldn’t cause additional problems.
Aggressive or deep angiomyxoma grows deeper under the skin. Despite the name, it is not malignant, but it can grow rapidly and it has a tendency to recur even after the tumor is completely removed. The limited number of cases where such growths turned cancerous involved aggressive tumors. Treatment usually starts with surgery to cut out the tumor and patients may be offered chemotherapy to see if it will suppress recurrence of the growth.
As a matter of routine, a medical provider may send a sample to a pathologist for examination to confirm the diagnosis. The pathologist can check on the cell types involved and issue a report. If the growth is not angiomyxoma, the patient may need additional treatment, such as radiation for a malignant cancer. Samples can also be retained in the event they need to be referenced later, as for example if a patient later develops cancer and wants to know if it was connected to the earlier tumor.
This type of tumor is relatively rare. Patients diagnosed with angiomyxoma may find it difficult to get information on the growth and may be intimidated by articles in medical journals, many of which document unique cases. These can create the false impression that such growths are metastatic or cause unusual medical complications, which this is actually not the case. With surgery and monitoring, angiomyxoma usually doesn’t cause problems for patients, beyond aesthetic concerns when the growth is located in a visible areas like the face.