1. Pigmented epithelioid melanocytoma: favorable outcome after 5-year follow-up.
- Author
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Mandal RV, Murali R, Lundquist KF, Ragsdale BD, Heenan P, McCarthy SW, Mihm MC Jr, Scolyer RA, and Zembowicz A
- Subjects
- Adolescent, Adult, Aged, Australia, Biopsy, Child, Child, Preschool, Disease-Free Survival, Female, Follow-Up Studies, Humans, Lymphatic Metastasis, Male, Middle Aged, Neoplasm Invasiveness, Neoplasm Staging, Nevus, Blue secondary, North America, Skin Neoplasms secondary, Time Factors, Treatment Outcome, Young Adult, Epithelioid Cells pathology, Nevus, Blue surgery, Skin Neoplasms surgery
- Abstract
Pigmented epithelioid melanocytoma (PEM) is a recently described entity encompassing epithelioid blue nevus (of Carney complex) and most tumors earlier considered as so-called "animal-type melanoma". Loss of expression of a Carney complex gene, cyclic adenosine 3',5' monophosphate-dependent protein kinase regulatory subunit 1alpha, is observed in the majority of PEMs. Initial reports with short-term follow-up have suggested that although PEMs frequently metastasize to lymph nodes, they have a more favorable outcome than conventional melanomas. In this report, we present the results of long-term follow-up in 26 patients with PEMs from North America and Australia. There were 9 males and 17 females, with a median age of 20 years. The tumors involved the trunk (6 cases), extremities (12 cases), genitalia (1 case), and the head and neck region (7 cases) had a median Breslow thickness of 2.2 mm (range 0.80 to 10.0 mm) and a median Clark level of 4. Eight of the patients developed lymph node metastases. After a median follow-up period of 67 months (range 39 to 216 mo), all patients are alive and free of disease. These findings provide further evidence that PEM is a unique low-grade melanocytic tumor with limited metastatic potential (to lymph nodes), but a favorable long-term clinical course.
- Published
- 2009
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