A 59-year-old male patient was referred to the dermatology clinic with painless, nonpruritic skin lesions, coalesced around a large abdominal scar. He had a history of metastatic colon cancer and had undergone a hemicolectomy 3 years earlier, in addition to a cholecystectomy and subsequent liver resection that was performed through the same incision.
The lesions had appeared 10 weeks earlier and were vesicular-appearing, pink and violaceous in colour on examination. The clinical picture of the lesions made it more likely to be a cutaneous metastases. A skin biopsy was further performed to confirm the the diagnosis of the lesions. The findings were consistent with metastatic colon adenocarcinoma.
In colon adenocarcinoma, the abdominal skin is the most common site of cutaneous metastases. Moreover, sometimes in or around surgical scars, as seen in this case. Whether umbilical or cutaneous, asymptomatic internal malignancies often go undocumented. Moreover, there is a lack of literature on cutaneous metastases on
The patient was ultimately referred to hospice care and died 5 months after the presentation.
References
Randall, G., & Abrahams, J. (2020). Cutaneous Colon Cancer Metastases in a Surgical Scar. New England Journal of Medicine, 382(24), e90.
