COVID-19 infection and Leser-Trelat sign: Is there an association?

The etiology of the Leser-Trélat sign is still unknown, it is likely that viral infections like COVID-19 can be associated with eruptive seborrheic keratosis, although the exact pathogenesis is still not clear, but this phenomenon can be due to TNF-alpha and TGF-alpha and immunosuppression condition as well as in COVID-19 infection.

Seborrheic keratosis is a typical benign skin lesion that is almost always seen in elderly populations. The sudden increase in size or an increase in the number of these lesions is called Leser-Trelat sign, this sign is suggesting as a paraneoplastic appearance of internal malignancy. But, Leser-Trelat sign is also described in some nonmalignant conditions, for example, human immunodeficiency virus infection and human papillomavirus infection. Herein, we describe a patient with Leser-Trelat sign after recovery from COVID-19 infection with no evidence of internal malignancy. This case was partially presented as a poster in the 102nd Annual Congress of British Association of Dermatologists in Glasgow, Scotland from July 5 2022 to July 7 2022. British Journal of Dermatology, 187, 2022 and 35. The patient signed written informed consent to permit the publication of the case report without identifying data and to use the photography for publication. The researchers committed to maintaining patient confidentiality. Institutional ethics committee approved the case report (ethics code: IR.sums.med.rec.1400.384).