In vivo reflectance confocal microscopy for the differential diagnosis between vitiligo and nevus depigmentosus

Abstract

RCM can be used as an auxiliary diagnostic tool for the differential diagnosis between vitiligo and ND.

In vivo reflectance confocal microscopy in daily practice: Image features correlated to histopathology

“…The RCM en‐face visualization of skin layers displayed up to 5 × 5 mm of tissue, it provided more information of the distribution of melanin than the traditional histological vertical sections. In this study, we also proved that RCM could distinguish the loss or the reduction of melanin, this result was also confirmed by our previous study …”

Clinical differences between segmental nevus depigmentosus and segmental vitiligo

“…According to a recent study, in vivo reflectance confocal microscopy (RCM) can be used as an auxiliary diagnostic tool for the differential diagnosis of patients with vitiligo and ND. 9 In this RCM study, the most important feature for the differential diagnosis between the two disorders was the complete loss of pigment cells. Also, distribution of pigmented cells was different between the two diseases.…”

“…The mean relative melanin index, which represents the relative pigment levels, of ND lesions, was significantly higher than that of vitiligo lesions. According to a recent study, in vivo reflectance confocal microscopy (RCM) can be used as an auxiliary diagnostic tool for the differential diagnosis of patients with vitiligo and ND . In this RCM study, the most important feature for the differential diagnosis between the two disorders was the complete loss of pigment cells.…”

Decreased expression of KGF/FGF7 and its receptor in pathological hypopigmentation

“…1D). Thus, the loss of pigmentation in all the three hypopigmentary conditions could be explained, at least in part, by a reduced expression and secretion of KGF from dermal fibroblasts, which impair the melanosome uptake by the keratinocytes.To evaluate the contribution of the lesional keratinocytes on the inefficient melanosome transfer, we focused our attention on the above ND biopsy, because of the postulated defect of the organelle uptake in such disorder [11,12]. To dissect in vitro the process, we cocultured the MST-L melanocytes with primary keratinocytes derived from the ND (ND HKs) or from normal skin, at a seeding ratio of 1:40.…”

“…Although the loss of melanocytes is considered the main factor leading to skin colour impairment in such disorders, an altered melanogenesis or a reduced melanosome transfer from melanocytes to keratinocytes is also involved. In fact, it has been proposed that the differential feature of the ND disorder, compared with vitiligo, is the presence of melanocytes with defective melanosome transfer [11,12]. Given the crucial role of the secreted KGF/FGF7 in the modulation of the melanosome uptake by keratinocytes [2,4,9] and taking advantage of our in vitro models of melanosome transfer [5], we first investigated here the efficiency of melanosome transfer in the above-mentioned hypopigmentation conditions as well as the ability of supernatants (SNs) collected from primary cultured human dermal fibroblasts, derived from the different lesional skin samples or from healthy donors as described in the Data S1, to stimulate the process.…”