SEBORRHEIC keratoses, sometimes designated as verrucae seniles, seborrheic warts, pigmented papillomas, or verrucae pigmentosae, are relatively benign lesions which should be differentiated from precancerous senile keratoses. Seborrheic keratoses are sharply circumscribed, oval or round elevations, varying in size from 0.25 to 3 cm. These lesions are flat and multiple, but as their size increases they sometimes become pedunculated and covered with a greasy, friable scale. Common sites are the chest, interscapular region, waistline, and face. Early lesions are grayish-yellow; older lesions become yellowish-brown or black. They usually occur in persons aged 40 years or older.
Textbooks on genetics, such as those of Snyder1 and of Gates,2 do not contain any specific reference to this condition as being congenital. Recent observations on seven families, including those of two local physicians, have impressed me with the belief that Jadassohn's3 hereditary concept is at present among the more plausible