Acral lentiginous melanoma in the Turkish population and a new dermoscopic clue for the diagnosis

Abstract

Background: The incidence of acral lentiginous melanoma (ALM) in Caucasians is low. Dermoscopy enhances diagnosis of ALM; however, diagnostic accuracy may sometimes be poor due to the considerable proportion of amelanotic ALM variants. Objectives: To calculate the proportion of ALM among all melanoma subtypes and to determine the frequency of dermoscopic features of ALM in the Turkish population. Methods: Out of 612 melanomas, there were 70 cases of ALM, of which 46 showed sufficient image quality for retrospective study of dermoscopic features. Data from patients and their lesions was classified according to clinical features and histopathologic parameters. The dermoscopic variables evaluated were based on pertinent literature on dermoscopy of acral melanocytic neoplasms. Results: The prevalence of ALM among all melanoma subtypes was 11.4%. Parallel-ridge pattern (PRP) was detected in 60.8% of cases and irregular diffuse pigmentation (IDP) in 28.3%. The ALMs were amelanotic in 24%, showing an atypical vascular pattern in all cases; a new dermoscopic pattern, named “vascularized parallel-ridge pattern” (VPRP), was detected in 13% of ALMs. Irregular lines were observed in 81.8% of subungual melanomas and were often associated with a multicolored background. Conclusions: ALM has site-specific dermoscopic patterns, with PRP being the most prevalent pattern. The newly described VPRP pattern may be an additional clue for ALM diagnosis, especially in thin amelanotic melanomas.

Keywords

• acral lentiginous melanoma
• amelanotic melanoma
• nail unit melanoma
• parallel-ridge pattern
• dermoscopy