Abstract | BACKGROUND: The evaluation of patients with cicatricial alopecia is particularly challenging, and dermatopathologists receive little training in the interpretation of scalp biopsy specimens. Accurate interpretation of specimens from patients with hair disease requires both qualitative (morphology of follicles, inflammation, fibrosis, etc.) and quantitative (size, number, follicular phase) information. Much of this data can only be obtained from transverse sections. In most cases, good clinical/pathologic correlation is required, and so clinicians should be expected to provide demographic information as well as a brief description of the pattern of hair loss and a clinical differential diagnosis. RESULTS: CONCLUSION: The histologic features of five forms of cicatricial alopecia are reviewed. Dermatopathologists can utilize a "checklist" to catalog the diagnostic features of scalp biopsy specimens. In many, but not all, cases the information thus acquired will "match" the clinical and histologic characteristics of a form of cicatricial alopecia. However, because of histologic and clinical overlap between the forms of cicatricial alopecia, a definitive diagnosis cannot always be rendered.
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Authors | L C Sperling |
Journal | Journal of cutaneous pathology
(J Cutan Pathol)
Vol. 28
Issue 7
Pg. 333-42
(Aug 2001)
ISSN: 0303-6987 [Print] United States |
PMID | 11437938
(Publication Type: Journal Article, Review)
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Topics |
- Alopecia
(pathology)
- Biopsy
- Cicatrix
(pathology)
- Dermatology
(methods)
- Diagnosis, Differential
- Humans
- Scalp
(pathology)
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