The perilesional skin in vitiligo: a colorimetric in vivo study of 25 patients

The aim of this work was to study in vivo the perilesional skin in vitiligo with a colorimetric method. Twenty-five patients affected by vitiligo were included. For each patient, three different areas were considered: the lesional, the perilesional and the normal skin as far as 5 cm from the nearest vitiligo spot. Skin pigmentation measurements were performed with a chromameter. The results showed that luminance L-* decreased significantly in relation to increasing distance from the vitiligo spot. As expected, L-* in the vitiligo spot was significantly higher than in the perilesional (P < 0.0001) and normal skin (P < 0.0001). There was a small difference in L-* between normal skin as far as 5 cm from the nearest vitiligo spot and perilesional skin. In contrast, the pigmentation index (b(*)) gradually increased from lesional to perilesional to normal skin. Furthermore, the comparison of the b(*) value between the normal skin as far as 5 cm from the nearest vitiligo spot was higher than perilesional skin and it was statistically significant (P < 0.0001). Our results in vivo underline that the perilesional skin near the vitiligo spot is lighter than normal skin as far as 5 cm from the vitiligo spot.