Only the site where the infection has first come into contact with the skin is affected. The initial sign of about 80% of Lyme infections is an erythema migrans (EM) rash at the site of a tick bite, often near skin folds such as the armpit, groin or back of the knee, on the trunk, under clothing straps, or in childrens hair, ears or neck. Most people who get infected do not remember seeing a tick or a bite. The rash appears typically one or two weeks (range 3–32 days) after the bite and expands 2–3 cm per day up to a diameter of 5–70 cm (median 16 cm). The rash is usually circular or oval, red or bluish, and may have an elevated or darker center. In about 79% of cases in Europe but only 19% of cases in endemic areas of the U.S. the rash gradually clears from the center toward the edges, possibly forming a "bulls eye" pattern. The rash may feel warm but usually is not itchy, is rarely tender or painful and takes up to four weeks to resolve if untreated.The EM rash is often accompanied by symptoms of a viral-like illness, including fatigue, headache, body aches, fever and chills but usually not nausea or upper-respiratory problems. These symptoms may also appear without a rash or linger after the rash has disappeared.
The tumour is described as invasive and is clinically characterised by faster growth than the benign chondroid syringoma. They can generally be diagnosed when presenting "an epithelial component, eccrine or apocrine differentiation and myoepithelial component of fluctuating prominence" (IADVL, 2004). Diagnosis is recommended to follow microscopic analysis to ensure correct examination. Treatment
There currently is no established guideline for the standardised treatment of malignant chondroid syringomas, due to their rarity. However, the efficacy of treatment for malignant mixed tumours depends on the time of diagnosis. An immediate and broad surgical excision "with clear margins" (Tural, Selçukbiricik, Günver, Karışmaz, and Serdengecti, 2013) is considered curative and to be the most successful treatment. This treatment aims for the most efficacious disease control. It is largely agreed that chemotherapy and radiotherapy are ineffective yet are sometimes still recommended, yet radiotherapy reacts positively to skeletal metastasis. Combination chemotherapy for MCS is reported as unbeneficial. MCS is reported to have a high and continual risk of recurrence of metastasis, some patients experiencing metastasis nearly twenty years after the primary examination. Thus this necessitates consistent clinical follow-up in order to maintain a benign state of the tumour and achieve disease control. Prognosis
Malignant mixed tumours have a poor prognosis that is deemed unpredictable due to its spread being lymphatic or blood-borne. As there have only been a limited number of cases that have been reported, prognostic points are challenging to confirm, however mainly "include size, histological type, lymph node involvement, and distant metastasis" (Garcia, Atun, and Fernando, 2016).