Surgery is the most common treatment of cancer of the vulva. Radical local excision takes out the cancer and a larger portion of normal tissue around the cancer. Lymph nodes may also be removed. Laser surgery uses a narrow beam of light to remove cancer cells. Skinning vulvectomy takes out only the skin of the vulva that contains the cancer.
Simple vulvectomy takes out the entire vulva, but no lymph nodes.
Partial vulvectomy takes out less than the entire vulva. Radical vulvectomy takes out the entire vulva. The lymph nodes around it are usually removed as well. Chemotherapy combined with irradiation is most often used in patients with extensive local spread of vulvar cancer. Since treatment may inflove multimodality therapy, gynecologic oncologists are well suited to direct the care of patients with vulvar cancer.