Contagious epithelioma or molluscum: which areas of the skin are most often affected by the viral infection
Contagious epithelioma or molluscum: which areas of the skin are most often affected by the viral infection
The virus can be transmitted through contact with someone else’s towel, unsanitized razor blades, the edge of a pool or a sun lounger where a patient has sat.
Flesh-colored nodules appear out of nowhere. At first they are small, but they grow quickly – and now there is a whole colony of colorless peas on the body. Sometimes they increase in size, become inflamed, and become covered with crusts. Unpleasant and very unaesthetic. Doctors noted: in summer and autumn, there are usually more patients complaining of contagious epithelioma.
– A more popular name for the disease is molluscum contagiosum. This is a pathology of viral origin, – says Zhanna Prikhodko, a dermatologist. – Most often, the virus is transmitted through close contact with an infected person (touching, hugging). But you can get infected: by using someone else’s towel, an unsanitized shaving tool, or, say, just sitting in a bathing suit on the edge of a pool or a sun lounger where a sick person has just sat. After seven days, sometimes after two or three months (this is the incubation period for contagious epithelioma), a rash appears on the skin.
– Where does this name come from – mollusk?
– It is very conditional, the disease is not connected with animal mollusks. Perhaps the soft consistency of the peas resembles the body of a mollusk. In the center of each nodule there is a depression, when pressed, a thick white mass is released. Microscopic examination reveals so-called mollusk bodies, viral particles. Gateways for infection can be microtraumas, cuts. Areas of the body affected by dermatitis or too dry or sweaty skin also suffer.
– How is this disease diagnosed? — In typical cases, an experienced dermatologist can even recognize it by eye. In a more complex situation, for example, when it comes to layering of several skin diseases, optical microscopy is used. Occasionally, a biopsy of the rash element is performed with subsequent pathomorphological examination. I remember how parents brought a nine-year-old girl to the appointment, whose rash on her tummy resembled flat warts, so the disease was mistakenly treated by cauterizing the nodules with various means, and unprofessionally and for a long time. But the rash only spread.
Another patient – a young man – came for the guidance of a urologist with the words: “A mollusc has grabbed hold of me.” He was very scared by a suspicious, albeit painless neoplasm on the skin of the genitals and in the pubic area. And it is very good that the man did not hesitate, the disease did not spread, did not reach complications. By the way, if the rash appeared on the genitals, then both partners need treatment.
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