A Rare Presentation of Invasive Glomus Tumor in the Occipital Bone: Case Report

Abstract

Abstract Introduction: Glomus tumor is a perivascular tumor commonly originating from the digits. It is a benign tumor however, few author stated that it can potentially be malignant. Extra-digital glomus tumor is rare and challenging to be diagnosed based on imaging and without histopathological examination. It can mimic a variety of benign and malignant soft tissue neoplasms. Considering this entity in an extra-digital location is the way to accurately diagnose these patients, resulting in proper management. Case presentation: This is a 17-year-old male patient with an occipital region swelling with no trauma history or skin changes. Imaging of this of swelling do not give solid conclusion. Surgical resection was done and tuned to be glomus tumor. Following the surgical resection, the patient had no significant residual or recurrence on subsequent clinical follow-up. Conclusion: Glomus tumor at the scalp region is a diagnostic challenge mimicking malignancy and locally aggressive neoplasm. This entity should be considered as one of the differential diagnoses of hypervascular head and neck masses. Prompt accurate radiological diagnosis of such location is important due to the variability of differential diagnoses.