title: Primary dermal melanoma: A case report and molecular characterization.
abstract: Swetter et al. proposed primary dermal melanoma (PDM) as a distinct entity based on an excellent prognosis. The histopathological features of PDM are extremely similar to those of metastatic melanoma or clear cell sarcoma (CCS). We describe a 38-year-old woman with a subcutaneous tumor in her left thigh. Physical and imaging examinations showed no evidence of metastatic melanoma. The lesion showed obvious strong expression of KIT by immunohistochemistry, but no EWS-ATF1 fusion transcript specific for CCS was detected by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. In further analyses of KIT expression in other tumors, three of four primary melanomas (75%) and six of 12 metastatic melanomas (50%) were moderately or strongly positive, however, both the primary and metastatic lesions of CCS tested negative. We believe this to be a case of PDM, and emphasize the distinctiveness of PDM.
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, Institute of Health Biosciences, The University of Tokushima Graduate School, Japan.
authors.forename: Yasutoshi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Hida
authors.forename: Yoshiaki
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kubo
authors.forename: Osamu
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Miyajima
authors.forename: Seiji
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Arase
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D004252:DNA Mutational Analysis; D017809:Fatal Outcome; D005260:Female; D011905:Genes, ras; D006801:Humans; D008545:Melanoma / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology*; D015514:Oncogene Proteins, Fusion / Q000235:genetics; D048493:Proto-Oncogene Proteins B-raf / Q000235:genetics; D019009:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-kit / Q000378:metabolism; D012878:Skin Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology*; D014157:Transcription Factors / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: C111598:EWS-ATF1 fusion protein, human; D015514:Oncogene Proteins, Fusion; D014157:Transcription Factors; D019009:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-kit; C482119:BRAF protein, human; D048493:Proto-Oncogene Proteins B-raf