Problem: I have developed small, brownish pieces of skin that are dotted all over my neck. This is so unattractive and seems to be getting worse. What are these things and what can I do about them?
Solution: The good news is the growths that you see are almost certainly benign and nothing more than an unattractive pouching of the skin called skin tags, but or course your skin should be examined by your dermatologist or physician to be sure.
Technically called an acrochordonor, a skin tag is a small, benign, growth of skin connected to the body by a tiny or even imperceptible branchlike protrusion of tissue. Skin tags look like tiny bits of brown or flesh-colored tissue hanging loosely off of the skin. Typically they occur in sites where clothing rubs against the skin or where there is skin-to-skin friction, such as the underarms, neck, under the breasts, chest, back, chin, and sometimes the groin and eyelids.
Skin tags almost never develop when we are young; for some reason they occur as we get older, and there may even be a genetic component, though no one knows for sure. Occasionally a skin tag can become gnarled in such a way that the blood supply to the protrusion is cut off and the tag can turn red or black.
Getting rid of skin tags is probably one of the easiest cosmetic corrective procedures a physician can perform. All a doctor has to do is cut it off. Almost without exception the skin heals without any trace or remnant of the tag, there’s no scarring, and the tag won’t grow back. Of course you can still grow other skin tags but the one that was removed is gone forever.
Some physicians suggest removing the tag yourself by tying off the small stem that attaches the protrusion to the skin. This can be done by simply taking a piece of thread or dental floss and tightly tying off the tag; in a few days it simply falls off. However, if the skin tags are around the eyes it is essential to have them removed by an ophthalmologist.
