Undergone Flap Surgeries On Head Because Of Skin Cancer. Why Is She Experiencing Hardening On Face?

Posted on Thu, 18 Oct 2012

Medically reviewed by Ask A Doctor - 24x7 Medical Review Team

Thu, 18 Oct 2012 Answered on

Wed, 7 Nov 2012 Last reviewed on

Question : My mother in law has experienced hardening of her right side of her face. What could this be? She has recently undergone flap surgeries on her head because of skin cancer... She is also on dialysis for kidney failure.

Answered by Dr. Muhammad Ishfaq Habib (4 hours later)

Hi,

Thanks for the query

Skin cancer usually causes ulceration of the skin. Such ulcerations are described as rodent cell ulcers on face. So the hardening is unlikely to be related to skin cancer.

A possibility could be hardening and thickening after such surgeries could be related to scleroderma which occurs due to hyper immune activity. The patient with scleroderma results positive for antinuclear antibodies and anti centromere antibodies - so testing for antibodies using blood sample is advisable.

Please discuss with her treating doctor about the aforementioned condition. Treatment can be accordingly modified.

Hope this answers your query. If you still have some queries, feel free to ask

Regards

Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Prasad