New insights into photodynamic therapy using porphyrin precursors

Non- melanoma skin cancer (NMSC) is the most common cancer in Caucasians. The incidence of skin cancer continues to rise faster than that of any other cancer. More than out of 6 Dutch inhabitants develops skin cancer (mainly NMSC) before his 85th year of life.1 The majority of NMSCs are basal cell carcinomas (BCCs) and squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs). Non-melanoma skin pre-malignancies are Bowen’s disease (SCC in situ) and actinic keratosis. In the last 25 years, the absolute numbers of patients in the Netherlands with first, histologically confirmed BCCs increased by about 7-fold in both men and women. In 2015, an incidence of more than 44,000 newly-diagnosed BCC cases is expected, increasing to more than 57,000 in 2020. Subsequent BCCs in patients who have already been diagnosed with the first BCC are not included in these incidences, although the cumulative risk of developing one or more subsequent BCCs 5 years after diagnosis is 29%. The burden of skin cancer is mainly disease burden, functional- and cosmetic problems and care consumption because of the good prognosis (quod vitam). General practitioners and medical specialists will be increasingly burdened with the inspection, the diagnosis and/or the treatment of suspect lesions in the future.

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