Basal cell carcinoma (basalioma, white skin cancer)

Basal cell car­ci­no­ma is the most com­mon skin tumour in humans and belongs to the group of non-mela­n­o­ma (white) skin can­cers. Alt­hough the tumour is clas­si­fied as mali­gnant, it almost never forms meta­sta­ses; left unt­rea­ted, howe­ver, it can cau­se con­sidera­ble local dama­ge and grow deep into the tissue.

Cau­ses

The main cau­se is years of UV expo­sure from the sun or sun­beds. Peo­p­le with fair skin, blond or red hair, light-colou­red eyes and many freck­les are par­ti­cu­lar­ly at risk. Fre­quent sun­b­urns in child­hood, older age, fami­ly pre­dis­po­si­ti­on and a wea­k­en­ed immu­ne sys­tem also increase the risk.

Sym­ptoms

Basal cell car­ci­no­mas usual­ly appear as skin-colou­red or red­dish nodu­les with a pear­ly sheen and small visi­ble blood ves­sels on the sur­face. They can also pre­sent as red­dish sca­ly patches or indu­ra­ted yel­lo­wish-white plaques. They deve­lop pre­fe­ren­ti­al­ly on the face, head or upper body, in other words on are­as fre­quent­ly expo­sed to the sun.

Dia­gno­sis

The dia­gno­sis is initi­al­ly made by a skin exami­na­ti­on, often using a spe­cial der­ma­to­scope. Defi­ni­ti­ve con­fir­ma­ti­on is obtai­ned through a tis­sue sam­ple with his­to­lo­gi­cal examination.

Tre­at­ment

The stan­dard the­ra­py is com­ple­te sur­gi­cal rem­oval with a safe­ty mar­gin of healt­hy tis­sue. For super­fi­ci­al forms, cryo­the­ra­py, phot­ody­na­mic the­ra­py or spe­cial creams can also be used. In advan­ced cases, radio­the­ra­py or modern tar­ge­ted medi­ca­ti­ons are available. With ear­ly tre­at­ment the cure rate is over 95 percent.

As the risk of deve­lo­ping fur­ther basal cell car­ci­no­mas is increased, regu­lar fol­low-up checks with a der­ma­to­lo­gist are important. Con­sis­tent sun pro­tec­tion is essen­ti­al for prevention.