Study: Tattoos Can Cause Serious, Long-Term, Adverse Reactions

[mountaineer]

Study: Tattoos Can Cause Serious, Long-Term, Adverse Reactions
Grace Gold
‎May‎ ‎27‎, ‎2015
Yahoo Health

Whether it’s a skull, cross, rose, or mom’s name in a thorn bush wrapped around the bicep, about one quarter of American adults have a tattoo. But a new study says about one out of every 10 inkers does not anticipate something that can come along with them: a severe, ongoing skin reaction.

In the just-published NYU Langone Medical Center research that studied tattoo-clad New Yorkers, those who reacted to tattoos experienced a rash, itching or swelling that lasted anywhere from four months to several years, with the longest-lasting complications stemming from ink shades of red and black.

“While we know infections are a risk of tattoos and can be dependent on tattoo parlor practices, a lot of the complications in our study — and that I have seen in my patients — do not have to do with the tattoo artist or parlor practices, but rather the qualities of ink and how the body’s immune system responds to it,” Marie C. Leger, MD, PhD, study lead and Assistant Professor at the Ronald O. Perelman Department of Dermatology, tells Yahoo Health.

The 300 respondents ranged in age from 18 to 69, with most having no more than five tattoos — and 67 percent of studied tattoos were on the arms. “We were rather alarmed at the high rate of reported chronic complications tied to getting a tattoo. Given the growing popularity of tattoos, physicians, public health officials and consumers need to be aware of the risks involved,” added Leger.

While less than a third of the affected study participants saw a doctor for the reaction, the majority returned to the tattoo parlor to complain or ask for guidance. “Tattoo artists are ‘first responders’ when people have problems,” says Leger, who adds that a planned follow-up study will examine what kind of reactions artists see most frequently, and how clients are directed, in an effort to get people to the right place for help.

Experts are not surprised by the news. “While tattoos are popular among Americans, there is still little to no regulation of what exactly is being injected into the skin,” says Jeremy A. Brauer, MD, dermatologist and Director of Clinical Research at Laser & Skin Surgery Center of New York, where he has seen patients with tattoo reactions — most often to red ink. The majority of patients have allergic contact dermatitis, which is marked by redness, swelling and itching in the area of the tattoo.

Treatment of tattoo reactions “can be challenging” says Brauer, who uses oral antihistamines combined with oral or injectable steroids to quell the inflammation. Blistering sometimes occurs and requires wound care and dressings, while evidence of infection is treated with antibiotics. More recently, there have been reports of successful laser treatment with both ablative and non-ablative fractional lasers, adds Bauer.

For some, the discomfort never completely goes away, and they are even driven to remove the tattoo altogether. While nanosecond (“Q-switched”) lasers have been the tattoo removal standard, the newer PicoSure laser is now clearing tattoos in “far fewer treatments than before,” says Bauer. The laser also addresses and improves scarring that can be an accompanying issue with tattoos.

And when it comes to tattoo removal, there’s one design that stands out as the one most people want to get rid of: 52 percent of RealSelf.com doctors say tribal tattoos are the style they most frequently are asked to remove, for any number of reasons – from discomfort to regret.

Looking ahead, Leger also has plans for a bigger survey to determine what tattoo dye components are most closely tied to adverse reactions. She hopes her investigation might also reveal other factors that put some people at higher risk of suffering chronic complications.

[ABX]

The only people I know of who have had problems went to scratchers. This is becoming a big problem with the availability of guns and supplies all over the internet dirt cheap and the increasing popularity. Post on a Facebook garage sale type page you are looking for tattoo artist recommendations and you'll find hundreds of responses offering themselves or their brother to do it from their home.  Even if they think they are sterile, a professional artist in a licensed studio knows how to do a quick skin reaction test with the ink and also uses higher quality products than scratchers pick up off eBay.

[aligncare]

I'm not the same person at age 63 that I was at 22. I cannot imagine the psychological ramifications of bearing for the rest of my life an irreversible decision I made at 22 to get a tattoo. That's just not something I could ever have done.

[Paladin]

Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the LORD.

Leviticus 19:28

[ABX]

Leviticus 19:28

[PzLdr]

Never had a reaction from a tattoo. and I've got a bunch of 'em. [arms and chest].

[mountaineer]

Yikes.

Woman Undergoes Major Surgery, Doctors Realize Tattoo Ink was Mistaken for Cancer Cells
Posted: Jun 15, 2015 11:29 AM EDT
Updated: Jun 15, 2015 11:34 AM EDT

     
A California mother of four with cervical cancer had her reproductive organs surgically removed by mistake and it appears her tattoos are to blame.

The 32-year-old had recently been diagnosed. Her doctor's requested a PET/CT fusion scan, which requires that patients receive an injection of a radioactive tracer that makes tumors appear as bright spots on the scan, to see if the cancer had spread to other parts of the body.

The scans revealed not only the woman's cervical tumor, but also bright spots on the lymph nodes in her pelvis, which looked suspiciously like cancer cells, researchers wrote in their report case, published on June 8 in the journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Seeing this, doctors removed the woman's uterus, cervix, fallopian tubes and pelvic lymph nodes.

When doctors later examined the cells from the woman's lymph nodes, they saw the cells were not cancerous at all. Instead the cells contained deposits of tattoo ink. The woman had more than 14 tattoos on her legs. Doctors said ink from her tattoos had traveled from her legs into her lymph nodes.

"Those lymph nodes that were lighting up brightly on the PET scan were doing so because of the tattoo pigment that was in the lymph nodes," said study co-author Dr. Ramez Eskander, assistant clinical professor of gynecologic oncology at the University of California, Irvine Medical Center, who treated the woman.

The researchers did find that the woman had a small number of cancer cells in one of her pelvic lymph nodes, a condition called "micrometastasis." But this micrometastasis was too small to have shown up on the PET scan, so it was only by chance that the doctors found it, Eskander said.

Eskander went on to say that the woman is doing well and doesn't have any evidence of cancer recurrence.

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