Paraffinoma of lips and oral mucosa: Case report and brief review of the literature

Interstitial application of paraffin in plastic and reconstructive surgery is obsolete due to the development of permanent and extensive foreign body granulomas at the site of application. These granulomas can cause severe physical impairment and develop their own prognostic worth. Furthermore, the disperse oil droplets are not a locally stable suspension. Therefore, the desired aesthetic aspect can get lost in the course of a potential dislocation of the suspension. In addition, the interstitial confluence of non-resorbable droplets to larger oil drops causes palpable and sometimes visible indurations of the skin, the correlate of chronic inflammation. This case report describes the efforts undertaken to release the patient at least temporarily from her paraffin granulomas and to improve her appearance. The relevant literature is briefly discussed. Furthermore, we present some immunohistochemical findings to specify the foreign body reaction associated with paraffin injections into connective tissues.

Distinct granuloma responses in C57BL/6J and BALB/cByJ mice in response to pristane

Granuloma formation is an inflammatory response of the host against invading pathogens or indigestible substances. We generated mesenteric oil granulomas by injecting pristane into the peritoneal cavity (PC) of mice, and compared oil granuloma formation in the C57BL/6J and BALB/cByJ strains of mice. The formation and kinetics of oil granulomas were distinct between the two strains. In C57BL/6J mice, injected pristane induced oil granuloma formation at both the mesenteric centers (MG) and margins (SG). MG was resolving by 11 weeks, and SG persisted. In BALB/cByJ mice, MG developed slower but persisted longer than in C57BL/6J mice, and SG resolved sooner than in C57BL/6J mice. Injection of India ink revealed that phagocytes were localised mainly to the SG in C57BL/6J mice, but were located diffusely in both MG and SG of BALB/cByJ mice. SG cells expressed more monocyte chemotactic protein-1 (MCP-1) mRNA than MG cells in C57BL/6J mice, but there was no difference in MCP-1 expression between the MG and SG in BALB/cByJ mice. These observations suggest that the recruitment of inflammatory leucocytes under the direction of chemokines differentiates the patterns of granuloma responses to pristane in C57BL/6J and BALB/cByJ mice.