Cutaneous metastases of visceral tumours: a review

Abstract

A reference guide of cutaneous metastases is given; the clinical spectrum is adjusted to an actual status; state of the art of the treatment is accomplished. An epidemiological, improved registration and diagnostic work-up for targeted therapies in conjunction with dermatologists are favoured.

Tumor type-specific and skin region-selective metastasis of human cancers: another example of the “seed and soil” hypothesis

“…To further support the observations above, we compiled 444 skin metastasis cases from 7 previous reports with different primary tumors and corresponding regional distribution data [10,11,15,18,[22][23][24] and from 2 lung cancer-specific studies [25,26]. These data strongly support the notion that lung cancer preferentially produces chest (and less frequently head and neck) skin metastases, while colorectal cancer prefers abdominal skin locations in more than two thirds of the cases (Fig.…”

“…Nevertheless, the prevalence may increase due to the longer survival of cancer patients [10][11][12]. Although skin is usually involved in a later stage of progression, it is the first sign of dissemination in a small fraction of cases [13][14][15]. However, there are two key factors that warrant special attention in skin metastasis statistics.…”

“…However, there are two key factors that warrant special attention in skin metastasis statistics. First, a significant proportion of skin metastases are derived from cancer types that are closely connected to the skin such as melanoma, breast, or head and neck cancers [13][14][15]. Second, skin metastasis statistics describe natural frequencies and do not normalize the incidence with respect to the significant differences in the prevalence of the various cancer types.…”

“…We performed a meta-analysis on 174 skin metastatic cases reported in five different studies [15,18,[22][23][24] to identify location preferences of the primary tumors from different organs (Table 3). Importantly, lung, colorectal, and urogenital cancers displayed a preference to metastasize to their Data are expressed in percent of the number of respective cancer cases corresponding supradiaphragmatic and infradiaphragmatic skin regions.…”

“…Melanoma and primary tumors in proximity to the skin (e.g., breast or head and neck cancer) preferentially produce skin metastases by locoregional spreading using mostly the lymphatic dissemination route [10,11,[13][14][15]. In contrast, the mechanism for skin metastasis tumors residing in the body cavities is far less understood.…”