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Diseases » Keratoacanthoma » Summary

What is Keratoacanthoma?

Contents

Keratoacanthoma: Introduction
Types of Keratoacanthoma
Prognosis
Other names for Keratoacanthoma
What causes Keratoacanthoma?
What are the symptoms of Keratoacanthoma?
How is it treated?
Keratoacanthoma: Introduction

What is Keratoacanthoma?

Keratoacanthoma: A benign form of skin tumor that tends to resolve itself with time. Usually the skin lesion grows for about six weeks, remains stable for a variable length of time and then regresses slowly.
Keratoacanthoma: A dome-shaped, rapidly growing skin lesion composed of well differentiated squamous cells. It represents a proliferation of the infundibular epithelium of the hair follicle and its morphologic distinction from a well differentiated carcinoma may be difficult or impossible. Keratoacanthomas affect males more frequently than females and the majority tends to regress spontaneously. It has been suggested that keratoacanthoma represents a distinct subtype of squamous cell carcinoma of the skin. --2003
Source - Diseases Database
Keratoacanthoma: skin tumor that grows rapidly (especially in older people) and resembles a carcinoma but does not spread; it usually disappears spontaneously, often leaving a scar.
Source - WordNet 2.1

Keratoacanthoma is listed as a "rare disease" by the Office of Rare Diseases (ORD) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This means that Keratoacanthoma, or a subtype of Keratoacanthoma, affects less than 200,000 people in the US population.
Source - National Institutes of Health (NIH)

Keratoacanthoma: Introduction