Effectiveness of Home-use Light Emitting Diode Device for Seborrheic Dermatitis of the Scalp: a Preliminary Study / 대한의진균학회지

BACKGROUND: Seborrheic dermatitis (SD) is a chronic, relapsing inflammatory disease, mainly affecting the scalp and face. The pathogenesis of SD has been not fully understood yet, but may be related to the skin colonization of Malassezia species, lipophilic yeasts. Phototherapy with light emitting diode (LED) device has been become a new therapeutic modality for some skin diseases such as acne. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate effectiveness and safety of phototherapy with home-use LED in the treatment of patients with SD of the scalp. METHODS: Eight patients with mild-to-moderate SD of the scalp participated. The patients used a home-use LED device combined 395 nm blue light with 660 nm red light for 6~7 min twice daily for 8 weeks. Patients' assessments were made by clinical findings including erythema (0~15), scales (0~15), itching (0~10), and lesional extent (0~15). And clinical photographs were taken at 0, 2, 4 and 8 weeks, respectively. RESULTS: At 8 weeks after LED treatment, erythema (7.75 to 5.13, p=0.018), scales (7.38 to 4.13, p=0.017), itching (6 to 3, p=0.011) and lesional extent (8.25 to 5.25, p=0.017) were significantly decreased, respectively. Satisfactory scores were also relatively high (mean 8.13 of 10). No severe adverse reaction was reported, excepting hair dryness (n=1) and brief stinging sense (n=1). CONCLUSION: Home-use LED was effective and safe in the treatment of SD of the scalp. These results suggest the LED device might be an adjuvant therapeutic tool in the treatment of Malassezia species associated diseases such as dandruff and SD. Further long-term and large-scale studies are required to assess the efficacy and safety of home-use LED.

Pigmented Eccrine Porocarcinoma / 대한피부과학회지

Eccrine porocarcinoma is a rare cutaneous neoplasm arising from the eccrine sweat duct. It may arise de novo or evolve from a pre-existing poroma or hidroacanthoma simplex. The pigmented variant of porocarcinoma is very rare, and its heavy pigmentation can lead to misdiagnosis of seborrheic keratosis or melanoma. An 82-year-old male patient presented with a painful, brown-to-black colored plaque measuring 4x4.5 cm with a central pedunculated nodule that measured 2.5x2 cm on his right posterior thigh. A small, pigmented papule had developed 10 years prior and had gradually increased in size. Histopathologic examination of the nodule revealed lobulated tumor islands composed of atypical basaloid cells in the periphery, eosinophilic squamous cells in the center, and pigmented dendritic cells scattered throughout nests of the tumor. Carcinoembryonic antigen and epithelial membrane antigen were expressed in the tumor cells and the dendritic cells stained positive for S-100 and HMB45. Histopathologic findings from the plaque showed many pigmented nests embedded within the epidermis that were composed of small, polygonal, pigmented basaloid cells. Pigmented eccrine porocarcinoma arising from pigmented hidroacanthoma simplex was diagnosed clinically and histopathologically. The tumor was completely excised. We report a case of pigmented porocarcinoma, which should be included among clinically important differential diagnoses apart from melanoma.