Skin Cancer: 13-Year Experience at the Department of Dermatology, Hospital Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Abstract

Background: Unlike other types of cancers, skin cancer has received little attention in Malaysia, and there's little awareness of it among the public. According to the third report of the National Cancer Registry, Malaysia (2003-2005), skin cancer ranked the tenth most common cancer in Malaysia. Aim: The objective of this study was to determine the demography and the types of skin cancers seen in the Department of Dermatology, Hospital Kuala Lumpur. Methods: This was a 13-year retrospective review of all patients with skin cancers seen at the Department of Dermatology, Kuala Lumpur Hospital between 2005-2017. All patients confirmed to have skin cancer histologically were included in this study. Results: The total number of patients diagnosed to have skin cancer between the 13-year period was 426. The mean age of the patients was 59.5 ± 17.8. 56.1% of the patients were male and 43.9% were female. Majority of the patients were Chinese (46.2%), followed by Malay (34.3%), Indian (11.5%) and other ethnic groups (8.0%). The commonest type of skin cancer was basal cell carcinoma (31.9%), followed by cutaneous lymphoma (25.4%) and squamous cell carcinoma (24.2%). Malignant melanoma was not common and accounted for 5.6% of the patients. Other types of skin cancers such as cutaneous metastasis were seen in 4.5% of patients, extramammary Paget's disease in 4.2%, Kaposi sarcoma in 1.9% and other types of tumors accounted for 2.3% of the patients. Majority of the patients with primary cutaneous lymphomas were cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL), which accounted for 97.2% of all cases of primary cutaneous lymphomas. Conclusion: Basal cell carcinoma was the commonest skin cancer seen at the Department of Dermatology between 2005-2017. This is consistent with the reports from other parts of the world, which reported basal cell carcinoma as the commonest type of skin cancer.