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Cutaneous Horn: The Bizarre Skin Tumor

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Cutaneous horn is a condition where horns are actually grown on humans, and some look really cool in that. In fact, there are also people with this condition who refuse to remove the horns because they like them. The thing is that a cutaneous horn is actually a keratinous skin tumor but it has an appearance of a horn. Some cases look rather like coral or wood, and the size ranges from small to large. The details are below so don’t forget to check them out.

1What Is A Cutaneous Horn?

Cutaneous horns occur due to the build-up of keratin, and the growths can be harmless, precancerous, or cancerous. The ones on the face are more likely to be precancerous or cancerous than those elsewhere on the body. While skin tumors have various forms and shapes, the cornu cutaneum looks like horns instead; either curved or straight. A cutaneous horn is yellow-brown in color, and it is usually one centimeter long but longer ones are not uncommon. This condition is the most common in elderly people who are between 60 to the mid-70s, and those with fairer skin.

We still don’t know what causes the cutaneous horns but exposure to radiation can be one of the reasons. This is because a majority of the locations where the condition occurs is on the person’s face and hands. However, there are also cases where the horns are on the chest, neck, penis, and shoulder. Along with that, the underlying lesions are actinic keratosis, seborrhoeic keratosis, viral warts, and well-differentiated squamous cell carcinoma. The treatments can include surgical excision, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy.

2Notable Cases

There have been some interesting cases of cutaneous horns throughout the years, mainly because of the appearance of the horns. The earliest record would be in 1930, a Manchurian farmer named Wang; nicknamed The Human Unicorn. He had a 33-centimeter horn protruding from the back of his head. Robert Ripley actually tried to find this man, but to no avail. Or the largest record in the 19th century of a 76-year-old Parisian woman, Madame Dimanche, had a 25-centimeter horn on her forehead. Below are more of the most well-known ones in the 21st century are:

Zhang Ruifang

Zhang Ruifang was a 101-year-old Chinese woman from Henan Province with the cutaneous horn that started growing in 2010. She had the horn on the left side of her head that grew to a length of over 6 centimeters. The horn resembled a devil horn, and it began as a patch of rough skin that grew larger and larger. Then another horn on the right side began to grow as well. She really liked the look of it, and she refused to have the horns removed.

Liang Xiuzhen

Another woman from China also had the same condition when she visited the doctor to check the horn in 2015. The horn was already 12 centimeters long at the time, and it was actually the second horn. It began around 8 years prior as a black mole in 2013 but the doctors couldn’t diagnose it. Then the mole cracked open and the horn began to sprout but it fell off shortly after. However, another horn began to grow from the same spot and it grew much faster. This second horn is composed of keratin, meaning it is a cutaneous horn.

Shyam Lal

A 74-year-old man in Madhya Pradesh saw a horn-like mound start forming on his skin after a head injury several years ago. This mound on the top of his skull got bigger over time, and he had been asking his barber to trim it for years. However, it kept growing and he finally went to the doctor to have an operation to remove it in 2022. The x-ray showed that the roots were not too deep, and the operation to remove the 10-centimeter horn was a success. Surgeons used a razor to remove the horn, and he had to stay in hospital for 10 days to recover.

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