Abstract
Childhood nevi, whether acquired or congenital, pose a particular diagnostic and therapeutic challenge for the pediatric surgeon. Fueled by the fear of potential malignant transformation, many surgeons are now being asked to evaluate and surgically remove moles and other skin lesions at increasingly higher rates. Despite the heightened awareness of the increasing incidence of pediatric melanoma, diagnosis and management in this population can still be challenging given the disease’s variable presentation and behavior. Furthermore, there are a number of benign skin lesions common in childhood that can be easily confused with melanoma or act as precursors to malignancy. A thorough understanding of the characteristics of both benign and malignant skin lesions of childhood is thus essential to a practicing pediatric surgeon.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Suggested Reading
Clemente C, Cochran AJ, Elder DE, Levene A, Mackie RM, Mihm MC, Rilke F, Cascinelli N, Fitzpatrick TB, Sober AJ. Histopathologic diagnosis of dysplastic nevi: concordance among pathologists convened by the World Health Organization Melanoma Programme. Hum Pathol. 1991;22(4):313–9.
Corcoran J, Bauer BS. Cutaneous lesions in children. In: Bentz ML, Bauer BS, Zuker RM, editors. Principles and practice of pediatric plastic surgery. St. Louis: Quality Medical Publishing; 2008. p. 83–104.
Friedman RJ, Farber MJ, Warycha MA, Papthasis N, Miller MK, Heilman ER. The “dysplastic” nevus. Clin Dermatol. 2009;27(1):103–15.
Hawryluk EB, Liang MG. Pediatric melanoma, moles and sun safety. Pediatr Clin North Am. 2014;61:279–91.
Jen M, Murphy M, Grant-Kels JM. Childhood melanoma. Clin Dermatol. 2009;27:529–35.
Lange JR, Balch CM. Melanoma in children: heightened awareness of an uncommon but often curable malignancy. Pediatrics. 2005;115:802–3.
Moscarella E, Piccolo V, Argenziano G, Lallas A, Longo C, Castagnetti F, Pizzigoni S, Zalaudek I. Problematic lesions in children. Dermatol Clin. 2013;31:535–47.
Pappo AS. Melanoma in children and adolescents. Eur J Cancer. 2003;39:2651–61.
Schaffer JV. Pigmented lesions in children: when to worry. Curr Opin Pediatr. 2007;19:430–40.
Tromberg J, Bauer BS, Benvenuto-Andrade C, Marghoob AA. Congenital melanocytic nevi needing treatment. Dermatol Ther. 2005;18:136–50.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Farmer, R.L., Afifi, A.M. (2017). Nevi and Malignant Melanoma. In: Mattei, P., Nichol, P., Rollins, II, M., Muratore, C. (eds) Fundamentals of Pediatric Surgery. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-27443-0_107
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-27443-0_107
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-27441-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-27443-0
eBook Packages: MedicineMedicine (R0)