Clinical outcomes and risk of recurrence among patients with vaginal intraepithelial neoplasia: a comprehensive analysis of 576 cases.

Abstract

ObjectiveTo evaluate the clinical outcomes of vaginal intraepithelial neoplasia (VAIN) and to assess the risk of recurrence and progression to invasive vaginal carcinoma.MethodsA retrospective review of the clinicopathologic data and clinical outcomes was performed on patients who were diagnosed with VAIN at a single center between January 2000 and July 2016. Demographics, treatments, and clinical outcomes were abstracted from medical records.ResultsA total of 576 patients with VAIN1–3 were included in the study analysis. The distribution of VAIN1–3 was as follows: VAIN1 31.1%, VAIN2 45.3%, and VAIN3/carcinoma in situ (CIS) 23.6%. In VAIN1 patients, observation was performed in 29.1% of the cases and 48.8% obtained regression. In VAIN2+ patients, management included observation (3.5%), topical management (6.5%), laser ablation (75.3%), excision (14.1%), and radiotherapy (0.5%) with the following rates of recurrence/progression: 46.2%, 62.5%, 26.4%, 32.7%, and 0%, respectively. Four patients among VAIN3/CIS patients (3.2%) developed invasive vaginal cancer during the follow-up period with a median time to cancer diagnosis of 21.4 months (range, 5.0–44.8 months). On multivariate analysis, high-risk human papillomavirus (HPV) positivity and treatment method were found to be independent risk factors for recurrence and progression (p=0.003 and p=0.001).ConclusionPatients with VAIN are at high-risk of recurrence, but the risk of progression to vaginal cancer is relatively low. Laser or excision provides higher regression rate than topical agent or observation, and high-risk HPV positivity is a risk factor for recurrence. Whatever the treatment method is used, however, the high rate of recurrence warrants long-term follow-up surveillance.