BACKGROUND:At present, there are few efficient therapies for infantile hemangioma, and the pathogenesis mechanisms remain unclear.
OBJECTIVE:To review the literatures available on the epidemiology, pathophysiology and pathogenesis of infantile hemangioma, to understand the research progress on the pathogenesis of infantile hemangioma, and to provide a reference for developing new drug therapies.
METHODS:A computer-based online search was performed in the PubMed database for literatures related to the pathogenesis, physiopathological features and epidemiology data of infantile hemangioma published from January 2009 to February 2014. The subject headings are“hemangioma, capil ary, classification, epidemiology, etiology, embryology, cytology, physiopathology, pathology, immunology, genetics, drug therapy, therapy”.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION:Accumulating evidence has investigated the occurrence, development and regression of infantile hemangioma. However, no large-scale, multi-central epidemiology data are reported, and there is no theory explaining the pathogenesis of infantile hemangioma completely. Moreover, the relationship between al those theories about the pathogenesis remains unclear. The most important obstacle constraining the research is the lack of ideal animal model of infantile hemangioma. Due to the restrictions of nude mice models, it is imminent to develop new animal models for infantile hemangioma research.