Overall, five-year survival rates for vulvar cancer are around 78% but may be affected by individual factors including cancer stage, cancer type, patient age and general medical health. Five-year survival is greater than 90% for patients with stage I lesions but decreases to 20% when pelvic lymph nodes are involved. Lymph node involvement is the most important predictor of prognosis. Thus, early diagnosis is important.

Prognosis can range considerably for patients, depending where on the scale they have been staged. Generally speaking, the earlier the cancer is diagnosed, the better the prognosis. The overall 5-year survival rate for all stages of penile cancer is about 50%.

Anatomical staging supplemented preclinical staging starting in 1988. FIGO’s revised TNM classification system uses tumor size (T), lymph node involvement (N) and presence or absence of metastasis (M) as criteria for staging. Stages I and II describe the early stages of vulvar cancer that still appear to be confined to the site of origin. Stage III cancers include greater disease extension to neighboring tissues and inguinal lymph nodes on one side. Stage IV indicates metastatic disease to inguinal nodes on both sides or distant metastases.

Diagnosis is confirmed via biopsy of the tissue(s) suspected to be affected by SCC. For the skin, look under skin biopsy.

The pathological appearance of a squamous cell cancer varies with the depth of the biopsy. For that reason, a biopsy including the subcutaneous tissue and basalar epithelium, to the surface is necessary for correct diagnosis. The performance of a shave biopsy (see skin biopsy) might not acquire enough information for a diagnosis. An inadequate biopsy might be read as actinic keratosis with follicular involvement. A deeper biopsy down to the dermis or subcutaneous tissue might reveal the true cancer. An excision biopsy is ideal, but not practical in most cases. An incisional or punch biopsy is preferred. A shave biopsy is least ideal, especially if only the superficial portion is acquired.

Several tests are used to diagnose vaginal cancer, including:

- Physical exam and history

- Pelvic exam

- Pap smear

- Biopsy

- Colposcopy

Recommendations for women with vaginal cancer is not to have routine surveillance imaging to monitor the cancer unless they have new symptoms or rising tumor markers. Imaging without these indications is discouraged because it is unlikely to detect a recurrence or improve survival, and because it has its own costs and side effects. MRI provides visualization of the extent of vaginal cancer.

Prevention

The differential for OSSN includes pterygium, pingueculum, papilloma, solar keratosis, lipoma, lymphoma, chronic blepharoconjunctivitis, inflammation, melanoma, ocular pannus, pyogenic granuloma, kaposi sarcoma, keratocanthoma, mucoepidermoid carcinoma, pseudoepitheliomatous hyperplasia, and adenocarcinoma. While confocal microscopy can be used for diagnosis, biopsy is considered the standard, especially before treatment with a cytotoxic medication.

The first step to diagnosing tonsil carcinoma is to obtain an accurate history from the patient. The physician will also examine the patient for any indicative physical signs. A few tests then, maybe conducted depending on the progress of the disease or if the doctor feels the need for. The tests include:

Fine needle aspiration, blood tests, MRI, x-rays and PET scan.

There are several treatment options for penile cancer, depending on staging. They include surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, and biological therapy. The most common treatment is one of five types of surgery:

- Wide local excision—the tumor and some surrounding healthy tissue are removed

- Microsurgery—surgery performed with a microscope is used to remove the tumor and as little healthy tissue as possible

- Laser surgery—laser light is used to burn or cut away cancerous cells

- Circumcision—cancerous foreskin is removed

- Amputation (penectomy)—a partial or total removal of the penis, and possibly the associated lymph nodes.

Radiation therapy is usually used adjuvantly with surgery to reduce the risk of recurrence. With earlier stages of penile cancer, a combination of topical chemotherapy and less invasive surgery may be used. More advanced stages of penile cancer usually require a combination of surgery, radiation and chemotherapy.

In addition to all the above, treatment of the underlying disease like brucellosis, is important to limit disease recurrence.

Diagnostic tests typically include complete blood tests, urinalysis, urine culture, X-rays of the abdomen and chest, and bladder imaging. The definitive diagnosis of bladder cancer will require a tissue biopsy and subsequent examination of the cells under the microscope.

This form of cancer is often seen in those who chew tobacco or use snuff orally, so much so that it is sometimes referred to as "Snuff dipper's cancer." Chewing betel nuts is an additional risk factor commonly seen in Taiwan.

Definitive diagnosis of Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) requires examination of biopsy tissue. An ideal biopsy specimen is either a punch biopsy or a full-thickness incisional biopsy of the skin including full-thickness dermis and subcutaneous fat. In addition to standard examination under light microscopy, immunohistochemistry (IHC) is also generally required to differentiate MCC from other morphologically similar tumors such as small cell lung cancer, the small cell variant of melanoma, various cutaneous leukemic/lymphoid neoplasms, and Ewing's sarcoma. Similarly, most experts recommend longitudinal imaging of the chest, typically a CT scan, to rule out that the possibility that the skin lesion is a cutaneous metastasis of an underlying small cell carcinoma of the lung.

The basis of deciding the T stage depends on physical examination and imaging of the tumor.

Because most bladder cancers are invasive into the bladder wall, surgical removal is usually not possible. The majority of transitional cell carcinomas are treated with either traditional chemotherapy or nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs.

Checking the cervix by the Papanicolaou test, or Pap test, for cervical cancer has been credited with dramatically reducing the number of cases of and mortality from cervical cancer in developed countries. Pap test screening every three to five years with appropriate follow-up can reduce cervical cancer incidence up to 80%. Abnormal results may suggest the presence of precancerous changes, allowing examination and possible preventive treatment. The treatment of low-grade lesions may adversely affect subsequent fertility and pregnancy. Personal invitations encouraging women to get screened are effective at increasing the likelihood they will do so. Educational materials also help increase the likelihood women will go for screening, but they are not as effective as invitations.

According to the 2010 European guidelines, the age at which to start screening ranges between 20 and 30 years of age, but preferentially not before age 25 or 30 years, and depends on burden of the disease in the population and the available resources.

In the United States, screening is recommended to begin at age 21, regardless of age at which a woman began having sex or other risk factors. Pap tests should be done every three years between the ages of 21 and 65. In women over the age of 65, screening may be discontinued if no abnormal screening results were seen within the previous 10 years and no history of CIN 2 or higher exists. HPV vaccination status does not change screening rates. Screening can occur every 5 years between ages 30 and 65 when a combination of cervical cytology screening and HPV testing is used and this is preferred. However, it is acceptable to screen this age group with a Pap test alone every three years. Screening is not beneficial before age 25 as the rate of disease is low. Screening is not beneficial in women older than 60 years if they have a history of negative results. The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) guideline has recommend for different levels of resource availability.

Liquid-based cytology is another potential screening method. Although it was probably intended to improve on the accuracy of the Pap test, its main advantage has been to reduce the number of inadequate smears from around 9% to around 1%. This reduces the need to recall women for a further smear. The United States Preventive Services Task Force supports screening every 5 years in those who are between 30 and 65 years when cytology is used in combination with HPV testing.

Pap tests have not been as effective in developing countries. This is in part because many of these countries have an impoverished health care infrastructure, too few trained and skilled professionals to obtain and interepret Pap tests, uninformed women who get lost to follow-up, and a lengthy turn-around time to get results. These realities have resulted in the investigation of cervical screening approaches that use fewer resources and offer rapid results such as visual inspection with acetic acid or HPV DNA testing.

The long-term outcome of squamous cell carcinomas is dependent upon several factors: the sub-type of the carcinoma, available treatments, location(s) and severity, and various patient health-related variables (accompanying diseases, age, etc.). Generally, the long-term outcome is positive, as less than 4% of Squamous cell carcinoma cases are at risk of metastasis. Some particular forms of squamous cell carcinomas have a higher mortality rate. One study found squamous cell carcinoma of the penis had a much greater rate of mortality than some other forms of squamous cell carcinoma, that is, about 23%, although this relatively high mortality rate may be associated with possibly latent diagnosis of the disease due to patients avoiding genital exams until the symptoms are debilitating, or refusal to submit to a possibly scarring operation upon the genitalia. Squamous cell carcinoma occurring in the organ transplant population is also associated with a higher risk of mortality.

Anal Pap smears similar to those used in cervical cancer screening have been studied for early detection of anal cancer in high-risk individuals. In 2011, the HIV clinic implemented a program to enhance access to anal cancer screening for HIV-positive men. Nurse practitioners perform anal Papanicolaou screening, and men with abnormal results receive further evaluation with high-resolution anoscopy. The program has helped identify many precancerous growths, allowing them to be safely removed.

Surgical excision or laser therapy are possible treatments. Surgical excision alone was effective for controlling VC, but elective neck dissection was not necessary even in patients in the advanced stages.

Large-cell carcinoma (LCC), like small-cell carcinoma (SCC) is very rare and only accounts for about 5% of all cervical cancers. Early-stage LCC are extremely aggressive and difficult to diagnose due to the sub-mucosal location of the tumor and intact overlying mucosa. As with SCC, in LCC early cases are asymptomatic. Later stages present with irregular bleeding, vaginal spotting, discharge, and pelvic pain. The basis for treatment of LCC tumors is derived from therapy used for SCC; when diagnosed, multimodal therapy should be considered just as with SCC.

Most conjunctival squamous cell carcinomas are removed with surgery. A few selected cases are treated with topical medication. Surgical excision with a free margin of healthy tissue is a frequent treatment modality. Radiotherapy, given as external beam radiotherapy or as brachytherapy (internal radiotherapy), can also be used to treat squamous cell carcinomas.

It used to be thought that cases of CIN progressed through these stages toward cancer in a linear fashion.

However most CIN spontaneously regress. Left untreated, about 70% of CIN-1 will regress within one year, and 90% will regress within two years. About 50% of CIN 2 will regress within 2 years without treatment.

Progression to cervical carcinoma in situ (CIS) occurs in approximately 11% of CIN1 and 22% of CIN2. Progression to invasive cancer occurs in approximately 1% of CIN1, 5% in CIN2 and at least 12% in CIN3.

Progression to cancer typically takes 15 (3 to 40) years. Also, evidence suggests that cancer can occur without first detectably progressing through these stages and that a high grade intraepithelial neoplasia can occur without first existing as a lower grade.

It is thought that the higher risk HPV infections, have the ability to inactivate tumor suppressor genes such as the p53 gene and the RB gene, thus allowing the infected cells to grow unchecked and accumulate successive mutations, eventually leading to cancer.

Treatment does not affect the chances of getting pregnant but does increase the risk of second trimester miscarriages.

Diagnosis is established by transurethral biopsy. Types of urethral cancer include transitional cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, adenocarcinoma, and melanoma.

Cervical cancer is staged by the International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) staging system, which is based on clinical examination, rather than surgical findings. It allows only these diagnostic tests to be used in determining the stage: palpation, inspection, colposcopy, endocervical curettage, hysteroscopy, cystoscopy, proctoscopy, intravenous urography, and X-ray examination of the lungs and skeleton, and cervical conization.

Since many, if not most, anal cancers derive from HPV infections, and since the HPV vaccine before exposure to HPV prevents infection by some strains of the virus and has been shown to reduce the incidence of potentially precancerous lesions, scientists surmise that HPV vaccination may reduce the incidence of anal cancer.

On 22 December 2010, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Gardasil vaccine to prevent anal cancer and pre-cancerous lesions in males and females aged 9 to 26 years. The vaccine has been used before to help prevent cervical, vulvar, and vaginal cancer, and associated lesions caused by HPV types 6, 11, 16, and 18 in women.

Treatment for CIN 1, which is mild dysplasia, is not recommended if it lasts fewer than 2 years. Usually when a biopsy detects CIN 1 the woman has an HPV infection which may clear on its own within 12 months, and thus it is instead followed for later testing rather than treated.

Treatment for higher grade CIN involves removal or destruction of the neoplastic cervical cells by cryocautery, electrocautery, laser cautery, loop electrical excision procedure (LEEP), or cervical conization. Therapeutic vaccines are currently undergoing clinical trials. The lifetime recurrence rate of CIN is about 20%, but it isn't clear what proportion of these cases are new infections rather than recurrences of the original infection.

Surgical treatment of CIN lesions is associated with an increased risk of infertility or subfertility, with an odds ratio of approximately 2 according to a case-control study.

The treatment of CIN during pregnancy increases the risk of premature birth.

External beam radiotherapy has been used in one person to prevent the relapse and growth of tumor metastases to the head and neck regions. The prophylactic applications of radiation have been noted as “encouraging” in this one case, reducing some tumors and eliminating others.

Another study with a couple of the same authors found that radiotherapy after surgery helped with the reduction and cure of head and neck tumors in additional cases. The researchers suggest that external beam radiotherapy should be part of the treatment course for patients who have or at risk of developing tumors in the head and neck areas.