The practical usefulness of dermoscopy in general dermatology

Beside to traditional use, dermoscopy is more and more used in the assessment of other "general" dermatologic conditions, namely scalp and hair disorders (trichoscopy), nails abnormalities (onychoscopy), skin infections and infestations (entomodermoscopy), and cutaneous inflammatory diseases (inflammoscopy). Among the list of new applications of dermoscopy, the study of inflammatory dermatoses is probably the most promising topic in terms of development and usefulness, considering the large number of such disorders and the frequent problems in their differential diagnosis which the dermatologist encounters in own daily clinical practice. In this paper, we report selected relatively common clinical differential diagnosis issues concerning inflammatory dermatoses (and some clinically related noninflammatory conditions), analysing them by a dermoscopic point of view in order to assist their noninvasive resolution according to the available literature data and our personal experience, including papulosquamous dermatoses (guttate psoriasis, pityriasis lichenoides chronica, pityriasis rosea, lichen planus, lymphomatoid papulosis, classic pityriasis rubra pilaris, papulosquamous sarcoidosis, disseminated forms of porokeratosis and papulosquamous chronic GVHD), dermatoses presenting with erythematous-desquamative patches/plaques (plaque psoriasis, eczematous dermatitis, pityriasis rosea, mycosis fungoides, subacute cutaneous lupus erythematosus), palmar psoriasis vs. chronic hand eczema, scalp psoriasis vs. seborrheic dermatitis, erythematous-desquamative disorders typically involving the elbows (psoriasis vulgaris, circumscribed juvenile pityriasis rubra pilaris, dermatomyositis/Gottron's sign), itchy papulonodular dermatoses (hypertrophic lichen planus, prurigo nodularis, nodular scabies and acquired perforating dermatosis), common facial inflammatory skin diseases (rosacea, seborrheic dermatitis and demodicidosis), lichen sclerosus vs. morphea, urticaria vs. urticarial vasculitis and common inflammatory cicatricial alopecia (discoid lupus erythematosus, lichen planopilaris and folliculitis decalvans)