Histological Findings in Korean Patients with Rosacea

Park, Sang Yeon; Lee, Jin Wook; Ahn, Sung Ku

Abstract

BACKGROUND
Rosacea is characterized by erythema of the face that persists for several months or longer. Rosacea is usually diagnosed based on clinical presentation and a biopsy is rarely performed for diagnostic purposes. However, a biopsy may be helpful when the symptoms are atypical.
OBJECTIVE
We identified commonly appearing histological characteristics of rosacea such as inflammation, sebaceous hyperplasia, granulomatous reaction, epidermal hyperplasia, Demodex, pustules, and fibrosis. In addition, we evaluated these according to clinical subtype.
METHODS
We examined the histological findings of 200 rosacea patients who visited our hospital. Histological findings were evaluated according to clinical subtype. The standard classification and staging method published by the National Rosacea Society was used for clinical classification.
RESULTS
The erythematotelangiectatic and papulopustular types of rosacea were the most common. Mild inflammation was found in 56.0% of the patients (1 and 1+) and 49.0% showed inflammation greater than 2 degrees. The most commonly observed histological features across all subtypes were sebaceous hyperplasia followed by epidermal hyperplasia and Demodex. However, sebaceous hyperplasia and Demodex were not observed in ocular rosacea.
CONCLUSION
Some histological findings such as inflammation, granulomatous reaction, sebaceous hyperplasia, pustule, Demodex, epidermal hyperplasia, and fibrosis were commonly observed in rosacea. There were no distinctive subtype-specific characteristics, but various histological characteristics were observed in a single clinical subtype.