Cutaneous Neoplasms - Benign Lesions

Michelle Pelle, M.D.
Disclosures		The author has no relationships with commercial interests related to the content of the presentation.

The Planners of this activity have no relationships to disclose.

Michelle T. Pelle, MD, is assistant professor of dermatology at the University of California-San Diego School of Medicine, and an assistant editor for eMedicine online journal. Here, she discusses the features, differential diagnosis, and therapy for benign cutaneous neoplasms.

This lecture and the post-test is worth 1.5 credit hours.

Dr. Pelle describes the epidermis, dermis, and hypodermis and their structure and function. She discusses several benign proliferations of the epidermis, including seborrheic keratoses (SK) and its risk factors, especially sun exposure, as well as associated conditions such as the sign of Leser-Trélat which may be a harbinger of internal malignancy, as well as its variant dermatosis papulosa nigra.

Other benign proliferations of the epidermis include linear epidermal nevus and nevus sebaceous, nevus comedonicus and porokeratosis and their location, symptoms and treatment are detailed.

In a section on benign melanocytic proliferations (BMP), Dr. Pelle describes, with the aid of illustrative graphics, their incidence, appearance, and location ... and the various types of BMP including congenital melanocytic nevi, speckled lentiginous nevus, blue nevi, and halo nevi, and Mongolian spots. In the sections dealing with benign appendageal tumors, the lecture lists neoplasms derived from hair follicles, pilar cysts, pilomatricoma and trichepitheliomas ... as well as neoplasms derived from sebaceous glands and sweat glands. The lecture concludes with a discussion of benign cutaneous tumors of mesodermal origin, including pyogenic granuloma, leiomyomas, lipomas ... the latter including Dercum's disease and Madelung's disease.