Retroperitoneal tumor
The retroperitoneum can be habitat to a wide range of diseases, including rare benign tumors and diseases that might be primary or metastatic. The incidence of malignant tumors of the retroperitoneum is four times higher than that of benign lesions. A third of retroperitoneal tumors are sarcomas. Soft tissue sarcomas are uncommon tumors, with retroperitoneal sarcomas accounting for about 17% of the 2,000 cases of soft tissue sarcomas estimated each year in England and Wales. Each year, between 255 and 300 new cases of retroperitoneal sarcoma (RPS) are diagnosed in the United Kingdom. After the lower extremities, the retroperitoneum is the second most frequent site of development of malignant mesenchymal tumors. Because of their late-onset and anatomical location, retroperitoneal tumors present a number of therapeutic difficulties.
Because of their rarity, difficulty in identification, high recurrence rate following surgical removal, and unpredictable response to adjuvant treatment, retroperitoneal tumors in the pelvis are a challenging surgical pathology entity. Retroperitoneal tumors are frequently diagnosed late, in the advanced stages of local or systemic metastasis, due to their inaccessible anatomical location and late clinical presentation. As a result, many of these patients do not benefit from total surgical excision, leaving gynecologists with a significant diagnostic and therapeutic dilemma.