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Lupus vulgaris are painful cutaneous tuberculosis skin lesions with nodular appearance, most often on the face around nose, eye lids, lips, cheeks and ears.[1]:335 The lesions may ultimately develop into disfiguring skin ulcers if left untreated. In the 19th century, the chronic and progressive nature of this disease was particularly marked: it remained active for ten years, twenty years, or even longer and, proved resistant to all treatment until the breakthrough by Niels Ryberg Finsen using a form of "concentrated light radiation" now known as Photobiomodulation which won him a Nobel Prize.
The term "lupus" to describe an ulcerative skin disease dates to the late thirteenth century, though it was not until the mid-nineteenth that two specific skin diseases were classified as Lupus erythematosus and Lupus vulgaris. The term "lupus" may derive from the rapacity and virulence of the disease; a 1590 work described it as "a malignant ulcer quickly consuming the neather parts; ... very hungry like unto a woolfe".[2]
[edit] See also
- ^ James, William D.; Berger, Timothy G.; et al. (2006). Andrews' Diseases of the Skin: clinical Dermatology. Saunders Elsevier. ISBN 0-7216-2921-0.
- ^ "Lupus", Oxford English Dictionary, online second edition. Accessed 2006
[edit] External links
