Little red dots

[sspoloric]

I have noticed these little red dots on my arms lately they just show up then go away sometimes they will look like they dried up! An area will itch and I will then notice I have these little spots that look like the have blood under the skin what are those?

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator]

You most likely have petechiae - tiny leaks of blood from your capillaries under your skin:

healthline.com/health/pictu...

mayoclinic.org/symptoms/pet...

Assuming you have a CLL or leukaemia diagnosis, it is most probably due to falling platelet levels. Please check with your doctor/specialist - and if they are worsening, do so promptly.

Have you had a blood test recently and if so, do you know what your platelet count is? Are you on any treatment, as many treatments can cause petechiae per the Mayo Clinic article, including pretty well all CLL treatments?

Neil

[Que-sera-sera]

Wow..literally about an hour ago I just noticed one (sudden) red mark on my left arm and I was like; was that? And so I just got my Health unlocked notice and your post at very top, needless to say it caught my eye! Once I read it, it sounds slightly different cause mine looks more like a reddish burn but it's only one and it doesn't itch. I do have an appt this week and hopefully is not my platelets, which I thought were doing well, since last week I scratched my other arm and it crusted up and healed pretty quick!

Anyway...we shall see =\

[lankisterguy Volunteer]

I've posted often that I have had small red dots on the undersides of my arms and all over my legs since 1 year before my CLL diagnosis in 2008. Sometimes they appear connected in a web pattern. The color ranges from slightly more pink than my skin to distinctly red. Cold weather, CLL treatment and dry conditions make them darker and larger, and then they morph into a combination of Plaque Psoriasis and/or Seborrheic keratosis

mayoclinic.org/diseases-con....

I only got classic petechiae (as described by AussieNeil) and bruising during Ibrutinib treatment, when the dots became an itchy rash.

Many dermatologists and pathology specimens failed to generate a distinct diagnosis, usually listing: Psoriasis, Eczema, drug reaction, and CTCL as possible causes.

After successful photo therapy treatment with UVB light multiple times per week, a CTCL expert pathologist (Dr. Magro) ruled out CTCL

lymphoma.org/site/pp.asp?c=...

The pathologist observed that CLL cells and T cells accumulated in a specific layer of my skin, but the ratio of CD4 / CD8 ratio of T cells was not imbalanced enough to be CTCL.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

So she calls it T-cell dyscrasia.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/176...

Len

[Buckeye64]

In my case it was petechia. My platelets had dropped considerably so I was given Rituxan again. I was also bruising in other areas. It's nothing to play with. Get your labs drawn.

[SeymourB]

I get these on my forearms fairly often. They range in size from about 1mm to as much a 1cm. When fresh, they are fairly bright red, and then grow more brown with age. An individual dot lasts several weeks before it completely fades away. It stays fairly red for a week for me before I notice a color change.

My platelets have been normal all along - mid 200 thousand/uL. I've had abnormally high reticulocytes several times, but the hematologist/oncologist doesn't order that test or it's not reported by the lab each time. My last tests in May had high RBC ! The doctor did not think this was bad, and he couldn't explain the reticulocyte anomalies, except to ask if I had had any significant bleeding - which I had not.

I do take a single 83mg baby aspirin daily, because I sit so much, I am worried about thrombosis. My lower legs are quite swollen, and I wear 2-30mmHg knee high support hose, and do multiple leg exercises daily. I set an alarm on my cell phone to remind me to get up every half hour.

So I'm puzzled about this phenomenon, but am inclined to mentally file it along with skin tags as one of those annoying things that happens with age. (I'm 62, but I'm old for my age). I only get complete CBCs 2-3 times a year, so it's possible things vary a lot between tests, but after 7 years of testing, I would think we'd nail something down.

[Kathp]

I am not sure about the relationship with CLL but I have these every now and again and my son who is non-celiac gluten intolerant, suffered with this before he cut out gluten. If it's that it's called keritosis pilaris - does this help you in any way?

[bkoffman CLL CURE Hero]

Need to check platelets for petechiae which is bleeding under the skin.