A study of dermoscopy in patients of melasma in a tertiary care centre in North India

Abstract

Aims and Objectives: The aim of the study is to determine dermoscopic findings of melasma after evaluating them based upon clinical examination and to correlate each clinical picture with dermoscopic findings. Materials and methods: Various patients of melasma from December 2019 to December 2020 were enrolled from outpatient department. Detailed history was taken. The dermoscopic examination and photographic documentation of clinical as well as dermoscopic picture was done and findings were noted. Results: We enrolled 50 patients in study including 80% females and 20% males. Mean age of melasma in our study was 31.28 years. Mostly the patients were farmers and housewives with the most common precipitating factor being sun exposure.Twenty patients on clinical examination along with Wood’s lamp showed epidermal pattern, 18 patients showed mixed pattern, and 12 patients had dermal pattern. On dermoscopy, melasma showed perifollicular sparing in all patients (100%), but in 36 patients, along with perifollicular sparing, it also showed perifollicular pigmentation in some areas, granular pattern in 38 patients, globular pattern in 42 patients, blotches in 36 patients, telangiectasias in 30 patients, arcuate pattern in 32 patients, and annular in 12 patients.The frequency of findings was nearly similar in all three three types except for the arcuate pattern. In the dermal pattern, nearly 83% patients (P = 0.1) showed arcuate pattern as compared to 40% (P = 0.004) in epidermal pattern. Limitations: A larger sample size is required. Also, since a few of the patients were already on topical corticosteroids, it may have affected the dermoscopic findings. Conclusion: Dermoscopy is a noninvasive tool that can be used to diagnose and differentiate it from other disorders of hyperpigmentation, but it cannot be used to classify melasma into epidermal, dermal, or mixed pattern.