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To date, much confusion exists about the biological significance of dysplastic naevi and about the relationship between melanocytic dysplasia and clinical atypia.To use a digital dermoscopy analyser with a series of‘borderline’ pigmented skin lesions (i.e. dysplastic naevi andin situmelanomas) to find correlation between the studied variables and to determine their discriminating power with respect to histological diagnosis.The pigmented skin lesions (n = 174) were histologically examined by three experienced dermatopathologists and identified asin situmelanomas (n = 38) and dysplastic naevi (n = 136). The system evaluated 48 parameters as possible discriminant variables, grouped into four categories: geometry, colours, textures and islands of colour. Once the lesions were analysed (stepwise discriminant analysis), sensitivity, specificity and accuracy were calculated.At the end of the stepwise procedure the percentage of cases classified correctly was 71·8%. Of 136 dysplastic naevi only 98 were classified correctly, while 27 of 38in situmelanomas were recognized correctly.We conclude that there are so far no digital dermoscopic criteria that can clearly distinguish dysplastic naevi fromin situmelanomas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital dermoscopy analysis (DDA) exploits computerized analysis of digital images and offers the possibility of parametric analysis of morphological aspects of pigmented skin lesions by means of integration with dedicated software. We conducted a study by DDA in 141 melanomas, with the aim assessing whether the numerical variables extrapolated by univariate logistic analysis could be used in a system of multivariate analysis to predict melanoma thickness before surgery. Melanoma images were evaluated for 49 DDA parameters. Logistic analysis was conducted to identify statistically significant variables. The leave-one-out method was used to evaluate the predictive representations of rules for stepwise logistic classification. The percentage of correctly classified cases was calculated by a classification matrix. Melanomas less than 1 mm had a smaller area, faded borders and were more symmetrical than melanomas greater than 1 mm. The latter had a bluer colour and more random disposition of elements. The accuracy was 86.5%. Specifically, 97 of 108 thin melanomas (specificity 89.8%) and 25 of 33 thick melanomas (sensitivity 75.7%) were correctly classified. In conclusion, the predictive value of DDA for melanoma thickness was quite good. Moreover, DDA allowed us to know objectively those dermoscopic features important in the differentiation between thick and thin melanoma. However, further studies should be performed in a prospective setting before the clinical application.

Background: Very few studies have tried to clarify how pregnancy influences the morphology of pigmented skin lesions (PSL). Our purpose was to objectively determine, by digital dermoscopy analysis (DDA), any dermoscopic changes of acquired melanocitic nevi during pregnancy and after 1 year from delivery., Methods: Thirty-five healthy pregnant women and 35 age-matched female controls were enrolled in the study. Nevi of pregnant women were analysed by DDA between 5 and 8 weeks of pregnancy, between 39 and 41 weeks of pregnancy and 12 months after delivery. Nevi of control women were analysed by DDA in a month of the year matching the period of recruitment of pregnant women and 21 months later., Results: Multivariate analysis of variance (manova) for repeated measures revealed that dermoscopic variables SKIN-GREEN-AVERAGE, SKIN-BLUE-AVERAGE and CONTRAST changed during pregnancy but returned to non-significant values after a year from delivery. The variable ENTROPY showed significant differences between initial evaluation and 1 year after delivery. Finally, the variable VARIANCE OF BORDER GRADIENT showed a significant difference between the first and the last evaluations, in both pregnant and control subjects., Conclusions: The study showed that pregnancy leads to significant modifications in PSL, especially with regard to pigment network, globules and architectural order or disorder.

Background: Early detection of cutaneous melanoma is the most important step to improve prognosis. In recent years objective techniques have been developed to improve diagnostics of pigmented lesions superior to the naked eye. Digital dermoscopy offers several advantages such as independence from the investigator, format ready for teledermatology and image storage, and comparability., Setting: In a routine setting including three centres in Europe, i.e. Lugano and Locarno in Switzerland, and Dresden in Germany, the usefulness of digital dermoscopy in daily routine has been evaluated., Patients and Methods: Digital dermoscopy was performed with the DB-MIPS system in 1308 patients, and 3544 pigmented lesions were evaluated. A total of 466 pigmented lesions were surgically removed and classified by histopathology. Among those 52 melanomas and 299 dysplastic, naevi could be identified. DB-MIPS system evaluated 35 variables of geometrics, colour, colour distribution and texture. Lesion identification is realized by clustering. Another important part of the analysis was to study the decision making, i.e. removal or follow-up of lesions. The tendency to follow-up was defined as the ratio of (number of suspicious lesions-removed lesions)/suspicious lesions. The interventism is defined as the ratio of the number of removed lesions to the number of suspicious lesions., Results: The DB-MIPS system was robust and easy in handling in daily routine. The data analysis and digital imaging were realized in real time. Fifty-two melanomas could be identified including eight in situ melanomas and 33 T1a melanomas (thinner than 1 mm). Sensitivity of digital dermoscopy varied between 90% and 95% between the three centres. Specificity varied between 79.6% and 93.3%. The centres differed in the patient population, the mean diameter of pigmented lesions and decisions. Interventism varied between 36.3% and 76.0%, follow-up varied from 24% to 63%. Higher levels of clinician's false positive were associated with a higher percentage of interventism., Conclusions: Digital dermoscopy offers advantages for daily routine in detection of early melanoma. Sensitivity and specificity for early melanomas is high and thereby, the experienced dermatologist can be easily supported in daily routine of a pigment lesion clinic to improve diagnostics and hopefully prognosis in cutaneous melanoma.

Background: It has been clinically observed that patients' "normal" moles resemble each other. Whether this concept is applicable to dermoscopic practice has not been sufficiently studied., Objective: To investigate whether physicians evaluating dermoscopic images would identify common dermoscopic profiles of nevi within individual patients., Methods: Images of 205 nevi belonging to 18 patients were evaluated by 2 dermatologists for dermoscopic global pattern, color, and specific structures. We defined dermoscopic patterns as dominant if seen in >or= 40% of the patient's nevi; a minor pattern was defined as 20 to 39%., Results: A dominant pattern was seen in 15 patients (83%). In 13 (72%) of the patients, >or= 80% of the nevi were classified into one, two, or three global patterns. The reticular global pattern was the most prevalent dominant pattern, seen in 9 patients (50%); the homogeneous pattern was the most prevalent minor pattern, seen in 16 patients (89%)., Conclusion: Individuals tend to have one to three predominant dermoscopic nevus global patterns.

The objective of this study was to investigate whether digital surface microscopy (DSM) could be used for the follow-up and comparison of malignant and benign conjunctival pigmented lesions (CPLs). Thirty-nine CPLs [16 de novo malignant melanomas (MMs), one MM arising from primary acquired melanosis (PAM), six PAMs and 16 naevi] were digitally analysed and biopsied. All of the PAMs and 10 naevi, which had not been surgically excised, were followed up using DSM. Thirty parameters were evaluated grouped into four categories: geometry, colour, texture and islands of colour. None of the CPLs that were followed up, which comprised 10 naevocytic naevi and seven PAMs, showed any morphological change at DSM analysis, except for one PAM which developed an MM 1 year later. Of the geometric variables examined, the area, maximum diameter and minimum diameter showed significantly higher values in MMs compared with benign CPLs. With regard to the colour of CPLs, MMs were significantly darker and bluer than naevi. In the texture group, contrast was significantly higher in MMs. In the islands-of-colour group, the imbalance of blue-grey regions and the presence of dark areas were significantly higher in MMs. DSM greatly simplified the follow-up of CPLs, such as PAMs with atypia, by providing satisfactory quality images with high reproducibility; this technique is also easy to use and well accepted by patients. Moreover, this preliminary study allowed us to determine which objective variables could be important for distinguishing between benign CPLs and conjunctival MMs.

Background/purpose: Many differences in color, shape and dimension exist between different moles even in the same individual. Major differences might be accounted for anatomical location, genetic factors and by environmental factors, mainly sunlight exposure. Therefore, it would be of great value, when evaluating skin lesions, to take into account the degree of intra- and inter-variability of several diagnostic parameters. In order to assess the morphologic and chromatic differences between lesions belonging to different patients and between lesions belonging to the same individual, we examined objective digital parameters obtained with dermatoscopic analysis, using the DBDermo MIPS system (BIO MIPS Engineering, S.R.L, siena, Italy)., Methods: The automatic classifier inside the software is based on a 'match by similarity' algorithm, based on the measurement of the Euclidean distances of all variables considered from the reference image. Two-hundred and four clinically benign pigmented lesion, belonging to 18 patients were examined, stored and automatically processed. For each lesion objective parameters related to geometry, color and texture were automatically evaluated., Results: We found skin color (healthy skin) is objectively different from subject to subject and the lesion color is more similar among different lesions of the same patient than among lesions belonging to different individuals both in their darkest and slightly dark component. We also observed that lesion dimensions are individual correlates, i.e. the probability for a lesion to be large is higher when the other, in the same patient, is large., Conclusion: Many parameters of pigmented skin lesions evaluated by digital dermoscopy analysis are similar in the same patient and different from those belonging to different individuals. This indicates that, when considering a lesion, we should take into account the peculiar patient's characteristics.

Background: Differential diagnosis of melanoma from melanocytic nevi is often not straightforward. Thus, a growing interest has developed in the last decade in the automated analysis of digitized images obtained by epiluminescence microscopy techniques to assist clinicians in differentiating early melanoma from benign skin lesions., Purpose: The aim of this study was to evaluate diagnostic accuracy provided by different statistical classifiers on a large set of pigmented skin lesions grabbed by four digital analyzers located in two different dermatological units., Experimental Design: Images of 391 melanomas and 449 melanocytic nevi were included in the study. A linear classifier was built by using the method of receiver operating characteristic curves to identify a threshold value for a fixed sensitivity of 95%. A K-nearest-neighbor classifier, a nonparametric method of pattern recognition, was constructed using all available image features and trained for a sensitivity of 98% on a large exemplar set of lesions., Results: On independent test sets of lesions, the linear classifier and the K-nearest-neighbor classifier produced a mean sensitivity of 95% and 98% and a mean specificity of 78% and of 79%, respectively., Conclusions: In conclusion, our study suggests that computer-aided differentiation of melanoma from benign pigmented lesions obtained with DB-Mips is feasible and, above all, reliable. In fact, the same instrumentations used in different units provided similar diagnostic accuracy. Whether this would improve early diagnosis of melanoma and/or reducing unnecessary surgery needs to be demonstrated by a randomized clinical trial.

Since advanced melanoma remains practically incurable, early detection is an important step toward a reduction in mortality. High expectations are entertained for a technique known as dermoscopy or epiluminescence light microscopy; however, evaluation of pigmented skin lesions by this method is often extremely complex and subjective. To obviate the problem of qualitative interpretation, methods based on mathematical analysis of pigmented skin lesions, such as digital dermoscopy analysis, have been developed. In the present study, we used a digital dermoscopy analyzer (DBDermo-Mips system) to evaluate a series of 588 excised, clinically atypical, flat pigmented skin lesions (371 benign, 217 malignant). The analyzer evaluated 48 parameters grouped into 4 categories (geometries, colors, textures and islands of color), which were used to train an artificial neural network. To evaluate the diagnostic performance of the neural network and to check it during the training process, we used the error area over the receiver operating characteristic curve. The discriminating power of the digital dermoscopy analyzer plus artificial neural network was compared with histologic diagnosis. A feature selection procedure indicated that as few as 13 of the variables were sufficient to discriminate the 2 groups of lesions, and this also ensured high generalization power. The artificial neural network designed with these variables enabled a diagnostic accuracy of about 94%. In conclusion, the good diagnostic performance and high speed in reading and analyzing lesions (real time) of our method constitute an important step in the direction of automated diagnosis of pigmented skin lesions., (Copyright 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)

Noninvasive diagnostic methods such as dermoscopy or epiluminescence light microscopy have been developed in an attempt to improve diagnostic accuracy of pigmented skin lesions. The evaluation of the many morphologic characteristics of pigmented skin lesions observable by epiluminescence light microscopy, however, is often extremely complex and subjective. With the aim of obviating these problems of qualitative interpretation, methods based on mathematical analysis of pigmented skin lesions have recently been designed. These methods are based on computerized analysis of digital images obtained by epiluminescence light microscopy. In this study we used a digital dermoscopy analyzer with 147 clinically atypical pigmented skin lesions (90 nevi and 57 melanomas) to determine its discriminating power with respect to histologic diagnosis. The system evaluated 48 objective parameters used to train an artificial neural network. Using the artificial neural network with 10 variables selected by a stepwise procedure, we obtained a maximum accuracy in distinguishing melanoma from benign lesions of about 93%. Comparing this result with those of the many studies using classical epiluminescence light microscopy, it emerges that the method proposed is equal or even superior in diagnostic accuracy and has the advantage of not depending on the expertise of the clinician who examines the lesion.

Objectives: To use a digital dermoscopy analyzer with a series of "borderline" pigmentary skin lesions (ie, clinically atypical nevi and early melanoma) to find correlation between the studied variables and to determine their discriminating power with respect to histological diagnosis., Design: A total of 147 pigmentary skin lesions were histologically examined by 3 experienced dermatopathologists and identified as nevi (n = 90) and melanomas (n = 57). The system evaluated 36 variables to be studied as possible discriminant variables, grouped into 4 categories: geometries, colors, textures, and islands of color., Setting: University medical department., Patients: A sample of patients with excised pigmentary skin lesions (nevi and melanomas)., Main Outcome Measures: Sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of the model for evaluating "borderline" pigmentary skin lesions., Results: After multivariate stepwise discriminant analysis, only 13 variables were selected to compute the canonical discriminant function., Conclusion: The present method made it possible to determine which objective variables are important for distinguishing atypical benign pigmentary skin lesions and early melanoma.

Background: Teledermoscopy uses telecommunication technologies to transfer images of pigmented skin lesions, including clinical and anamnestic data, via e-mail to specialized centers for teleconsultation., Design: Sixty-six pigmented skin lesions examined on a face-to-face basis in a skin lesion clinic in L'Aquila, Italy, were sent via e-mail on a standard-resolution color monitor for consultation at a university dermatology department in Graz, Austria., Intervention: Digital photographs of the clinical and dermoscopic images of all pigmented tumors were taken with a stereomicroscope connected to a high-resolution video camera in Truevision advanced graphic array (Targa) format file and converted successively into a Joint Photographic Expert Group (PEG) format file. All lesions were excised surgically and diagnosed histopathologically., Main Outcome Measure: Diagnostic concordance between face-to-face diagnosis and telediagnosis., Results: The diagnostic concordance was 60 (91%) of 66 cases. The number of correct telediagnoses was lower, but the difference was not statistically significant (Wilcoxon test, P = .10). The accuracy of the telediagnoses was not related to the quality of the images, but highly depended on the level of diagnostic difficulty of a given pigmented skin tumor (Spearman correlation, P= .01)., Conclusion: Teleconsultation of clinical and dermoscopic images of skin tumors via e-mail provides a similar degree of diagnostic accuracy as face-to-face diagnosis.

Background/aims: It has now been established that ELM significantly improves the clinical diagnosis of pigmented skin lesions, particularly when associated with image analysis on digital pictures. Besides surface microscopes, so called "videomicroscopes" are nowadays commercially available. Thanks to their practicality and to their reasonable price and small volume, they could be usefully employed by general practitioners or peripheral dermatologists in their practice. The aim of our study was to evaluate the usefulness and the handiness of a videomicroscope provided with polarized light, and to compare images recorded in the polarizing mode to those of the same lesions recorded after application of oil and a glass slide., Methods: 114 images of benign pigmented skin lesions were recorded both in polarizing mode and in oil/slide mode observation. Digital images were then analyzed by means of a dedicated software, evaluating 34 different parameters., Results: The instrument is easy to handle and the acquisition of images is simple and quick. Polarizing mode observation enables the recognition of subsurface structures, like pigment network and capillaries. Red and blue components in the images tend to be more pronounced, when images are acquired by the polarizing system, whereas green components are prominent in oil images. Values referring to dark areas are also higher for oil images. However, the 2 observation modes provide digital images, whose values, in most cases, do not differ statistically., Conclusion: Videomicroscopes are cheap, space saving, and enable a quick examination of skin areas to be imaged. The possibility of a rapid switch from surface to subsurface polarizing mode observation, makes the examination procedure even faster. Our data demonstrate that polarizing mode observation and recording can be employed as a basis for clinical and computerized epiluminescence, particularly in situations, where a rapid screening of numerous patients and lesions is necessary.