Acrochordons

Definition

Acrochordons are a small benign tumor. Mostly it occurs in areas where the skin forms creases, such as the neck, armpits, and groin and are harmless lesions that appear to hang off the skin. They can develop in both men and women as they grow old. They are generally skin colored or darker and their size ranges from 1mm to 5cm.

Causes

It is very common, generally benign skin growths that occur most often after midlife. They are tiny skin protrusions, and may have a small narrow stalk connecting the skin bump to the surface of the skin. They are usually painless and do not grow or change, except for occasional irritation from rubbing by clothing or other friction. Their origin is unknown.

They are thought to be correlated with age and obesity. It occurs more commonly in people suffering from diabetes mellitus. It is expected that by the age of seventy, around sixty percent of people suffer from it. Someone has said that it is a old people diseases.

Symptoms

There are many Symptoms of the Acrochordons. Some of the common symptoms of acrochordons are:

• Skin growth.
• Located on the neck, armpits, trunk, body folds, or other areas
• Usually skin-colored, occasionally darker.
• Usually very small, but sometimes half an inch long.
• May have a narrow stalk.
• Located on the neck, armpits, trunk, body folds, or other areas.

They do not cause pain in most cases but can become irritated if rubbed hard or snagged on something. If acrochordons is torn there can be some heavy bleeding depending on the area of the body where it is located.

Treatment

Treatment is usually not necessary unless the cutaneous tags are irritating or are cosmetically displeasing and the diagnosis is conducted on the basis of appearance of the skin.

Small, pedunculated acrochordons may be removed with curved or serrated blade scissors, while larger skin tags may simply require excision. For small acrochordons, application of aluminum chloride prior to removal will decrease the amount of minor bleeding.

The acrochordons patients have three choices for treatment. The first is surgical removal where the tag is removed with a scalpel or surgical scissors. This can be mildly uncomfortable for the patient and result in scarring. There is also a chance for excessive bleeding especially with those patients who are taking blood thinners.