LICHEN PLANUS OF THE EYELIDS

Some areas of the body seem immune to the invasion of certain diseases. This appears to be true of the eyelids in lichen planus; but we saw five patients in whom the eyelids were the seat of unmistakable lesions of lichen planus and thought our observations worthy of record. A careful review of the voluminous literature on this disease reveals the fact that reports of localization to the eyelids are extremely rare. Juliusberg, 1 in his section in Jadassohn's handbook, dealt with only two such reports and stated that lichen planus of the eyelids is one of the rarest of manifestations. Gaucher and Druelle 2 in 1904, in describing a case of extensive lichen planus in a 53 year old man, referred to lesions on the lower palpebral conjunctivae. In 1924 Luhr 3 reported an odd example of generalized lichen planus. The patient was a man 75 years of age