Acrochordons – Causes, Symptoms and Treatments

Acrochordons is also known as Cutaneous tags. Cutaneous tags are very common, generally benign skin growths that occur most often after midlife. They are tiny skin protrusions, and may have a small narrow stalk connecting the skin bump to the surface of the skin. They are generally painless and do not grow or change, except for occasional irritation resulting from rubbing by clothing or other friction .



The surface of the skin tags may be irregular or smooth in appearance. Sometimes they are raised from the surface of the skin on a fleshy stalk called a peduncle. Although they are painless and do not change in shape or size, but they can result in occasional irritation from rubbing caused by clothing or other types of friction. If considered histologically, these lesions have a connective tissue stalk which is composed of loose collagen fibers with numerous dilated capillaries with overlying acanthosis, hyperkeratosis and papillomatosis in the epidermis.



Causes



It is very common, generally benign skin growths that occur most often after midlife. They are tiny skin protrusions, and may have a small narrow stalk connecting the skin bump to the surface of the skin. They are usually painless and do not grow or change, except for occasional irritation from rubbing by clothing or other friction. Their origin is unknown.

Symptoms of Acrochordons

Some of the common symptoms of acrochordons are :-

· Usually very small, but sometimes half an inch long.

· May have a narrow stalk

· Located on the neck, armpits, trunk, body folds, or other areas

· Usually skin-colored, occasionally darker



Diagnosis

Your doctor will ask about your symptoms and medical history, and perform a physical exam. Most acrochordons can be diagnosed without invasive tests, but in some cases, a skin biopsy may be necessary.

Treatment



They do not require any treatment. If one does not like them or they become sore due to rubbing caused by jewelry or clothing, they can be removed surgically. Healing process ranges from one to two weeks. New skin tags may occur even if the existing tags are removed. The different ways of removing skin tags are:



Cryosurgery



In this case the acrochordons are frozen and then they are removed quickly and painlessly. It is an expensive treatment which may require a longer duration of time.



In some cases, if acrocordons is not going, then it may be removed easily through surgery.



Acrochordons usually disappears fast by intake of Chromium Picolinate 200 mcg twice a day. Chromium Polynicotinate can also be taken for the purpose and is sold under the name Natrol ChromeMate .

When a acrochordons is irritated or cosmetically unwanted, treatment may be done by freezing the tag with liquid nitrogen, tying off the tag with a thread or suture so as to cut off the blood supply, or cutting off (excising) the tag with a scalpel or scissors.



The advantage of scissor removal is that the growth is immediately removed and there are instant results. The potential disadvantage of any kind of scissor or minor surgical procedure to remove tags is minor bleeding.

Possible risks with freezing or burning include temporary skin discoloration, need for repeat treatment(s), and failure for the tag to fall off.

There is no evidence that removing tags causes more tags to grow. Rather, there are some people that may be more prone to developing skin tags and may have new growths periodically. Some patients even require periodic removal of tags at annual or quarterly intervals.