Effects of ex vivo skin microbiopsy on histopathologic diagnosis in melanocytic skin lesions.

Effects of Ex Vivo SkinMicrobiopsy onHistopathologic Diagnosis inMelanocytic Skin Lesions Currently,histopathologicanalysis represents thepractical reference standard for the diagnosis of melanocytic skin lesions.However, thereare limitationsparticularly related to the morphologic nature of thehistopathologic interpretation and the influenceof theclinical informationon the finaldiagnosis.1 Toprovide lesional tissue frommelanocytic proliferations for molecular analysiswithout jeopardizing the conventional histopathologicdiagnosis,we inventedaminiaturizedbiopsydevicewith a totalwidthof 0.35mm, containing a sample chamber 0.15 mmwide. This device penetrates approximately 250 μm in healthy skin (ie, superficial dermis) to collect approximately 1600 cells.2 Thismicrobiopsydevice canbeusedwithout local anesthetic, and there is noneed for a suture. Our hypothesis is that the minimal skin damage caused by the microbiopsy does not interfere with the subsequent histopathologic diagnosis.