IMPROVEMENT OF MONITORING OF MELANOCYTIC SKIN-LESIONS WITH THE USE OFA COMPUTERIZED ACQUISITION AND SURVEILLANCE UNIT WITH A SKIN SURFACE MICROSCOPIC TELEVISION CAMERA

Background: Photographic documentation of melanocytic skin lesions is important. Storage and retrieval of slides, however, take much time an d space. Objective: Our purpose was to develop and clinically test a c omputerized acquisition and surveillance (GAS) unit with a television camera for monitoring including measurements of lesional areas. Method s: A CAS unit connected with a skin surface microscopic television cam era was used for monitoring of melanocytic nevi (MN). The lesional are a and the skin surface microscopic appearance (SMA) were analyzed afte r 10 to 21 months in 54 of 1355 MN. Results: In 19 MN (35.2%), changes were found. In eight cases, changes in size of more or less than 15% were detected; in five cases only the SMA changed. In six cases both c haracteristics changed. Conclusion: In approximately 25% of MN, change s were only detectable in the SMA but not with area measurements. This favors the use of systems such as CAS because only they allow a time- saving comparison of actual and previous images.