Dermatology: Practical and Conceptual


Image Letter | Dermatol Pract Concept. 2022;12(2):e2022053 1

Childhood Flexural Comedones
Li-wen Zhang1, MD, Juan Wu2, Lu Zheng1, Tao Chen1

1 Department of Dermatovenereology, Chengdu Second People’s Hospital, Chengdu, Sichuan, China

2 Sexually Transmitted Disease Institute, Shanghai Skin Disease Hospital, School of Medicine, Tongji University, Shanghai, China

Citation: Zhang L, Wu J, Zheng L, Chen T. Childhood flexural comedones. Dermatol Pract Concept. 2022;12(2):e2022053.  
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5826/dpc.1202a53

Accepted: August 14, 2021; Published: April 2022

Copyright: ©2022 Zhang et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-
NonCommercial License (BY-NC-4.0), https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/, which permits unrestricted noncommercial use, 
distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original authors and source are credited.

Funding: None.

Competing interests: None.

Authorship: All authors have contributed significantly to this publication.

Corresponding author: Tao Chen, Department of Dermatovenereology, Chengdu Second People’s Hospital, 165 Caoshi Street, Chengdu 
610017, Sichuan, China. E-mail: 13980427003@163.com

Case Presentation

A 20-year-old female complained of an asymptomatic 

 papule on the left postauricular skin that occurred shortly 

after birth. The lesion presented a single papule with double- 

orifice comedones (Figure 1A). At the same site, previous skin 

lesion or inflammation were not observed. The dermoscopy 

manifested double-ended pseudo-comedones (Figure  1B). 

Childhood flexural comedones (CFC) with late diagnosis in 

adulthood was established.

Teaching Point

CFC usually occur in the skin folds including axilla, neck, 

cubital fossa, and perineum, and present as double open-

ing comedones connected by a thin layer of the epidermis. 

Figure 1. (A) A single papule with double-orifice comedones on the left postauricular skin. (B) The dermoscopy manifested double-ended 

pseudo-comedon.



2 Image Letter | Dermatol Pract Concept. 2022;12(2):e2022053

The etiology hypotheses included potential precursors of 

hidradenitis suppurativa, friction, genetic background, and 

hamartomatous origin [1]. Histopathology showed typical 

open comedo with follicular plugging and infundibular dila-

tation [2]. Three different dermoscopic patterns of CFC have 

been described including cuneiform comedo, multi- orifice 

comedo, and double-ended pseudo-comedones [1]. The dif-

ferential diagnosis includes other diseases associated with 

comedones, such as nevus comedonicus, acne neonatorum, 

familial dyskeratotic comedones, and idiopathic dissemi-

nated comedones.

References

1. Piccolo V, Russo T, Silva Pereira C, Darlington MD, Argenziano 

G. Dermoscopy of childhood flexural comedones: description of 

4 cases. Int J Dermatol. 2018; 57(3):e21–e23. DOI: 10.1111/

ijd.13894. PMID: 29318614.

2. Larralde M, Abad ME, Munoz AS, Luna P. Childhood flexural 

comedones: a new entity. Arch Dermatol. 2007;143(7): 909–911.  

DOI: 10.1001/archderm.143.7.909. PMID: 17638736.