520 college students from a public university in the southwest were questioned to examine correlations between having a tattoo and the presence of tattoos among their family and friends. Tattoos among both friends and family were positively correlated with respondents' having a tattoo. The magnitude of friends' influence was about double the influence of family.

Several benign and malignant lesions have occurred in tattoos, including verrucae, granulomas, allergic reactions, basal cell carcinomas, and squamous cell carcinomas. In addition, seven documented cases of malignant melanoma occurring in tattoos have been reported in the English literature. We describe another patient with malignant melanoma in a tattoo.

BATEK, BATOK, AND WHATOK are various local words that denote a traditional tattooing practice among the peoples in the Cordillera Region, particularly in the province of Kalinga. Their bodies are inked with figurative designs of snake, centipede, frog, rice grain, and fern plant, among others, and interspersed with geometric motifs and patterns. These traditional tattoos speak strongly about th...

The Nd:YAG laser effectively removes or lightens amateur and professional tattoos. The biomechanics of the removal of tattoo particles at the cellular level are incompletely understood. We examined biopsies obtained from 35 amateur and professional tattoos (including coloured tattoos), treated on three or more occasions with the Nd:YAG laser. Biopsies taken immediately after laser treatment sho...

INTRODUCTION This quality improvement study tested three methods of tattoo alignment and isocentre definition to investigate if aligning lateral tattoos to minimise pitch, roll and yaw decreased set-up error, and if defining the isocentre using the lateral tattoos for cranio-caudal (CC) position improved isocentre reproducibility. The study population was patients receiving curative external be...

PURPOSE Historically, the process of positioning a patient prior to imaging verification used a set of permanent patient marks, or tattoos, placed subcutaneously. After aligning to these tattoos, plan specific shifts are applied and the position is verified with imaging, such as cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT). Due to a variety of factors, these marks may deviate from the desired position ...

BACKGROUND Amalgam tattoos result from deposition of metallic particles (eg, silver, mercury, copper, zinc, and tin) into the oral mucosa. Their clinical and histologic appearance is similar to that of decorative tattoos. OBJECTIVE To describe the successful use of a Q-switched alexandrite laser for removal of an amalgam tattoo. MATERIALS AND METHODS An amalgam tattoo on the buccal mucosa a...

432 CMAJ, March 6, 2012, 184(4) © 2012 Canadian Medical Association or its licensors A34-year-old man was referred to the dermatology clinic with a five-month history of his tattoos becoming red, scaly and painful. Over the same period, he noted fluctuating blurry vision in both eyes with associated pain and photophobia, along with shortness of breath. He had no history of pain in his joints or...