Pediatric Lichen Sclerosus and Non‐Accidental Trauma: A Systematic Review of Distinguishing Features and Co‐Occurrence
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Lichen sclerosus (LS) is a chronic autoimmune inflammatory skin disease predominantly affecting the anogenital area that can be mistaken for non-accidental trauma (NAT) in pediatric patients, such as sexual abuse. Such misdiagnoses can be distressing for families. This systematic review examined pediatric patients investigated for both LS and NAT to provide clinicians with guidance on distinguishing these conditions. METHODS: MEDLINE, Embase, and Web of Science were searched. Retrospective studies, case series, and case reports describing pediatric patients investigated for both LS and NAT were included. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze data due to heterogeneity in study designs and reporting. RESULTS: Of 113 studies identified, 25 studies encompassing 146 patients were included. The suspected NAT was sexual abuse in all cases (N = 146). The final diagnosis was LS in 130 patients (89.0%), and LS and sexual abuse in 16 patients (11.0%). Patients who experienced sexual abuse often had known offenders in their families (n = 6/13) and displayed withdrawn or hypersexualized behavior (n = 2/13, unreported in n = 3/16), while those without abuse exhibited age-appropriate behavior (n = 8/41) and denied sexual abuse (n = 6/41) and demonstrated positive interactions with caregivers (n = 4/41, unreported in n = 89). On exam, hymenal disruption or scarring (n = 8/13) was more common in abused patients, whereas those without abuse typically lacked trauma to the hymen (n = 27/41) or anus (n = 10/41). CONCLUSIONS: LS and sexual abuse may co-occur. Careful assessment of patient behaviors, home environment, and anogenital findings is crucial to avoid misdiagnoses that may be distressing for families. Limitations include small sample size, and lack of statistical comparisons.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.018 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.004 | 0.004 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.012 | 0.013 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".