Glomus tumors are relatively rare soft tissue skin tumors with a relatively high recurrence rate. Studies on the usefulness of microscopic resection are limited.
We collected information from the medical records of 245 patients, including cases of reoperation for recurrence, with pathologically diagnosed glomus tumor after subungual excision or finger abdominal soft tissue tumors at our hospital between April 2010 and December 2021. In this study, “recurrence” was defined as the presence of certain symptoms, such as pain and nail deformity on the same finger postoperatively, and presence of tumor confirmed by imaging or surgery.
Of 245 patients, 134 underwent microscopic excision and 111 underwent a procedure that did not use a microscope. The recurrence rate was 7.35% in all cases, 3.73% in cases with microscopic excision, and 11.7% in cases without the use of a microscope.
In this study, microscopy significantly reduced the incidence of recurrence. Using a microscope enabled more detailed tumor dissection and resection, which may have allowed detection of all the tumor. Our findings suggest that using a microscope for glomus tumor resection under the fingernail or in the finger abdomen is an effective technique.
