Sebaceous hyperplasia and skin cancer in patients undergoing renal transplant

One previous study has shown a higher prevalence of sebaceous hyperplasia (SH) in patients with heart transplant on immunosuppressive drugs as compared with sex-matched control patients.

We set out to compare the prevalence of SH in a cohort of patients undergoing renal transplant with age- and sex-matched control patients and to find any association with nonmelanoma skin cancer (NMSC) in these patients.

In all, 117 patients with renal transplant and 117 age- and sex-matched control patients were screened for the prevalence of SH and NMSC.

We found that 29.9% of our patients with renal transplant had SH; 16 of 35 (45.7%) of these patients had a history of NMSC as compared with 6 of 82 (7.3%) patients without SH (P < .001, odds ratio 10.7). In the age- and sex-matched control group, a total of 28 patients (23.9%) had one or more lesions of SH.

This study is small and will require confirmation with larger cohort studies.

In our cohort of patients with renal transplant we found a strong association of NMSC with SH. This association remained significant after correction of factors such as age, sex, skin type, and duration of transplant.