A rare case of intramuscular angioma involving the medial rectus muscle

ABSTRACT

Benign benign vascular tumors (e.g., hemangiomas) and malformations are commonly encountered lesions in all ages of life, especially in infancy and childhood. Hemangiomas are considered to be proliferative vascular lesions while malformations are defects of embryonal vascular morphogenesis. Less than 1% of hemangiomas within the body occur in skeletal muscle and of these approximately 15% have been reported to occur in the head and neck musculature (e.g. masseter, trapezius, sternocleidomastoid, mylohyoid, temporalis muscles) Intramuscular angioma (the preferred term for lesions formerly known as intramuscular hemangiomas by WHO Tumors of Soft Tissue and Bone Classification, 5th edition 2020) (IA) occurring in the extraocular muscles or palpebral muscles (orbicularis oculi) are extremely rare with only a few case reports in the English literature. To date, all the extraocular muscles have reportedly been involved. With the case reported herein, the medial rectus muscle appears to be the most common extraocular muscle involved.

KEYWORDS:

• Angioma
• hemangioma
• intramuscular angioma
• intramuscular hemangioma
• muscular tumor

Author Contributions

Dr. R Bentham (Ophthalmology resident) pulled over 15 reference articles, summarized them and provided the senior author (DRJ) with a brief synopsis of each. Dr. Bentham made a substantial contribution with respect to acquisition and analysis of previous work. She also presented the paper at our residents research day in Spring 2018 and the Canadian Ophthalmological Society meeting in 2020. I estimate her work at 35% of the paper. D Jordan drafted and fine-tuned the case report including abstract, case report and discussion; I estimate his work at 45% of the paper. Dr Farmer edited the pathology component of the paper and provided representative histopathological pathology pictures. I estimate his contribution to the paper as 20%. All individuals in the paper made substantial contributions to the design of the work, acquisition and analysis and final interpretation (review) of the paper.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the article.

Additional information

Funding

There was no financial support for this case report.