Malignant Melanoma of the Foot

족부의 악성 흑색종

Purpose: We reviewed the clinical finding of malignant melanoma of the foot in korean because it's advanced stage and extended lesion at diagnosis. Materials and Methods: Retrospective study was enforced about the 11 cases who has diagnosed to malignant melanoma of the foot from February 1995 to March 2004. The mean follow up period was 61 months. In this study we used age, sex, site, depth, histology, clinical stage, precursor lesion, misdiagnosis, interval to diagnosis, survival time, survival. Results: Average age was 58 years and number of female was six. Common site of involvement were heel of plantar surface (6 cases) and subungual area (2 cases). Depths of involvement were 0.3 to 10 mm, most common histological type was acral lentiginous melanoma (7 cases), stage 5 according to classification of Clark were 5 cases and stage 2 or more according to clinical staging were 8 cases. precursor lesion were benign melanocytic nevi (2 cases) and ill defined (9 cases). Chief complaint were increasing of size, color change, pain and ulceration. Conclusion: Malignant melanoma of the foot usually arise at nonvisible area and is easy to be misdiagnosed or delayed treatment. So it is hard to early diagnosis and have poor prognosis. So we need education and effort to early detection and diagnosis.