The impact of angiogenesis in the most common salivary gland malignant tumors

Abstract

Salivary gland carcinomas (SGCs) represent a group of rare tumors, with complete surgical resection being the main treatment option. Therapeutic armory for cases of locally aggressive, recurrent, and/or metastatic SGCs, though, remains poor since they exhibit high rates of resistance to systematic therapy. Angiogenesis is considered one of the contemporary hallmarks of cancer and anti-angiogenic factors have already been approved for the treatment of several cancer types. This review aims to summarize, in a histotype-specific manner, the most current available data on the angiogenic factors implicated in SGC angiogenesis, in order to highlight the differences between the most common SGC histotypes and the factors that may have a potential role as therapeutic targets.