Skin Lines

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Examination of lesion and determination of orientation of surgery to skin lines Always consider the orientation of the lesion of interest to skin lines as the resulting scar will be minimized if oriented with skin lines rather than across them.

In this image: Be mindful of skin lines before performing the procedure.

An easy way to ascertain the orientation of skin lines is to pinch the skin surround the lesion until the skin lines are evident. Skin over joints will frequently have wide scars despite appropriate orientation due to increased skin tension. The illustration below depicts skin lines over the entire body: Langer's Lines on anterior and posterior body surfaces.

In this image: Langer's Lines follow the tension lines of the human skin and the main fibers of the connective tissue of skin.

(By C. Langer [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. Downloaded on February 6, 2014.)

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