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Ever noticed how your old woolly jumpers tend to get little balls of wool fibres scattered over them? Especially where the jumper tends to rub on itself, like under your arms?
A similer sort of process, roughly speaking, gives rise to skin tags.
At locations where skin rubs on skin, or where skin rubs on collars, clothing or jewellery, it is common to find skin tags, particularly (but not exclusively) in people with olive (or darker) skin. Slight and imperceptible irregularities in the surface of the skin get magnified by rubbing into larger and larger bumps, then actual tags. The tags look like tiny half-inflated balloons of skin, and may or may not have some even pigmentation.
There's a medical significance to skin tags. People with skin tags tend to have "insulin resistance" and tend to be prone to diabetes, or of course may be already diabetic. Anyone with skin tags should see their GP for a diabetes assessment (or you can ask us to arrange same when you come in for a medical consultation or treatment).
Any new skin lesion should be examined by a doctor if you have any doubt whatsoever about its nature. but most skin tags are readily identified once you've seen a few.
The treatment is very simple. A small bleb of local anaesthetic is applied and then they are cut off. If necessary the base can be cauterised to stop any slight bleeding.
Another approach is to freeze the tags with liquid nitrogen but I have found this approach often ineffective, with a tendency to cause unwanted pigment changes if the liquid nitrogen is applied excessively.
Another approach is to snip them off without local anaesthetic, but this tends to leave a stump as the doctor takes extra care to avoid the normal skin at the base. Pressure must then be applied to deal with bleeding, as applying cautery to bleeding vessels would be painful without anaesthetic.
We find the most comfortable and effective approach is to anaesthetise the spot then cut and cauterise then apply a dressing.
On the other hand, some skin tags are so tiny and so numerous that anaesthetising and excising every last one would be impractical. If these tiny skin tags have any pigment in them, we can often treat them directly with the 532nm KTP laser. The laser heats the skin tag instantly, and the tag drops off after a few days.
Skin tags are easy. |
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