Aim

Clinical and histological evaluation of conjunctival lesions treated surgically over 1 year in our centre

Material and methods

Retrospective clinical and histological analysis of 312 conjunctival tumors surgically removed at the Department of Ophthalmology, Jagiellonian University in Krakow 2017. The lesions were unilateral in 298 (97.7%) patients and bilateral in 7 (2.3%) patients. The cohort consisted of 164 men and 141 women, aged 1 to 92 years (mean age of 47.9 years).

Results

Histological analysis confirmed benign lesions in 219 (70.2%) cases, malignant lesions in 61 (19.6%) cases and premalignant lesions in 32 (10.2%) cases. The most common pathology was nevus (138 cases, 44.2%), followed by primary acquired melanosis (PAM) without atypia (25 cases, 8%), melanoma (22 cases, 7%), MALT lymphoma (25 cases, 8%), PAM with atypia (14 cases, 4.5%) and squamous cell carcinoma (12 cases, 3.8%). The two most common anatomical locations were caruncle (75 cases, 24%) and bulbar conjunctiva (143 cases, 45.8%), both with (70 cases, 22.4%) and without (73 cases, 23.4%) corneal involvement.

Conclusions

Preliminary clinical diagnosis is not always consistent with ultimate histological findings. Although malignant neoplasms of the conjunctiva are significantly less common than the benign ones, they are life-threatening, so a prompt and accurate histological diagnosis is crucial. The age and sex of the patient, tumour location and bilateral occurrence can aid the preliminary diagnosis and clinical decision making about surgery.