PMID- 19708879 OWN - NLM STAT- MEDLINE DCOM- 20110712 LR - 20110331 IS - 1600-0560 (Electronic) IS - 0303-6987 (Linking) VI - 37 IP - 1 DP - 2010 Jan TI - Panniculitis: clinical overlap and the significance of biopsy findings. PG - 49-58 LID - 10.1111/j.1600-0560.2009.01404.x [doi] AB - BACKGROUND: Panniculitides are well-recognized clinicopathologic entities but the non-specificity of their clinical and pathological features often troubles the diagnostician. METHODS: This study retrospectively evaluates the clinical overlaps and the significance of histological findings among various panniculitides. RESULTS: The clinical evaluation in 55 panniculitides cases suggested the diagnosis of typical erythema nodosum (EN) in 26 cases, atypical EN in 17 cases, atypical nodular vasculitis (NV) in two cases, soft tissue infection in five cases and five cases remained unclassified. Skin biopsy evaluation provided definite panniculitis diagnosis in 53 cases including EN (28 cases), leukocytoclastic vasculitis (seven cases), NV (four cases), superficial thrombophlebitis (ST) (two cases), eosinophillic panniculitis (EP) (three cases), infection-related panniculitis (five cases), and one case each of erythema nodosum leprosum (ENL), lupus panniculitis (LP), pancreatic fat necrosis and acne conglobata with two cases remaining unclassified. Histologically, 'predominantly septal' and 'mixed panniculitis' were the chief inflammatory patterns in EN cases, while mixed panniculitis was seen in most LCV cases and predominantly lobular and mixed panniculitis in NV cases. CONCLUSIONS: Biopsy evaluation of a panniculitis lesion is usually significant, and the application of a combination of histologic features rather than of a single biopsy finding or an inflammatory pattern is helpful in the diagnosis of panniculitis. CI - Copyright (c) 2009 John Wiley & Sons A/S. FAU - Chopra, Rajan AU - Chopra R AD - Laboratory, Histopathology Division, King Fahd Hospital, Hofuf, Al-hassa, Saudi Arabia. FAU - Chhabra, Seema AU - Chhabra S FAU - Thami, Gurvinder Pal AU - Thami GP FAU - Punia, Raj Pal Singh AU - Punia RP LA - eng PT - Journal Article DEP - 20090825 PL - United States TA - J Cutan Pathol JT - Journal of cutaneous pathology JID - 0425124 SB - IM MH - Adipose Tissue/pathology MH - Adolescent MH - Adult MH - Aged MH - Biopsy MH - Child MH - Diagnosis, Differential MH - Erythema Nodosum/*diagnosis MH - Female MH - Humans MH - Male MH - Middle Aged MH - Panniculitis/*diagnosis MH - Retrospective Studies MH - Soft Tissue Infections/*diagnosis MH - Young Adult EDAT- 2009/08/28 09:00 MHDA- 2011/07/13 06:00 CRDT- 2009/08/28 09:00 PHST- 2009/08/28 09:00 [entrez] PHST- 2009/08/28 09:00 [pubmed] PHST- 2011/07/13 06:00 [medline] AID - CUP1404 [pii] AID - 10.1111/j.1600-0560.2009.01404.x [doi] PST - ppublish SO - J Cutan Pathol. 2010 Jan;37(1):49-58. doi: 10.1111/j.1600-0560.2009.01404.x. Epub 2009 Aug 25.