Cancer of the skin in blacks. III. A review of nineteen black patients with Bowen's disease.

In a series of nineteen black patients with Bowen's disease of the skin diagnosed between 1948 and 1982, twenty-one lesions occurred. Involvement on non-sun-exposed areas was three times more common than on sun-exposed areas. The most common location was the lower extremity. A history of arsenic ingestion could not be confirmed in any of the patients, but was suggested by histopathologic findings in at least one instance. Invasive lesions developed in five patients, three of whom subsequently died from metastatic disease. Five patients also had a second noncutaneous malignancy.