ABSTRACT
The term cavernous/capillary hemangioma is the most frequently abused/misused terminology for venous malformation (VM) through misunderstanding of the condition and still causes substantial confusion together with many of name-based eponyms of the old classification for congenital vascular malformations (CVMs). A hemangioma is a vascular tumor, fundamentally different from vascular malformation, not only in its anatomical, histological, and pathophysiological findings, but also in its clinical course. It does not present at birth but generally appears during the early neonatal period as a rapidly growing tumor with a distinctive growth cycle characterized by early rapid growth through the proliferation phase, soon followed by slow regression through the involutional phase. The (“extra-truncular”) VM is always present at birth as an inborn error; therefore, it remains throughout life, persisting as an amorphous vascular structure/tufts, and continues to grow commensurably at a rate that is proportional to the growth rate of the body. Therefore, the use of the term hemangioma should be limited to the vascular tumor represented by a genuine “hemangioma,” and the erroneously used term of capillary or cavernous hemangioma for the VMs should be terminated.
