CHICAGO – Have you ever worked on your laptop computer with it sitting on your lap, heating up your legs? If so, you might want to rethink that habit. Doing it a lot can lead to "toasted skin syndrome," an unusual-looking mottled skin condition caused by long-term heat exposure, according to medical reports. In one recent case, a 12-year-old boy developed a sponge-patterned skin discoloration on his left thigh after playing computer games a few hours every day for several months. "He recognized that the laptop got hot on the left side; however, regardless of that, he did not change its position," Swiss researchers reported in an article published Monday in the journal Pediatrics. Another case involved a Virginia law student who sought treatment for the mottled discoloration on her leg. Dr. Kimberley Salkey, who treated the young woman, was stumped until she learned the student spent about six hours a day working with her computer propped on her lap. The temperature underneath registered 125 degrees. That case, from 2007, is one of 10 laptop-related cases reported in medical journals in the past six years. The condition also can be caused by overuse of heating pads and other heat sources that usually aren't hot enough to cause burns. It's generally harmless but can cause permanent skin darkening. In very rare cases, it can cause damage leading to skin cancers, said the Swiss researchers, Drs. Andreas Arnold and Peter Itin from University Hospital Basel. They do not cite any skin cancer cases linked to laptop use, but suggest, to be safe, placing a carrying case or other heat shield under the laptop if you have to hold it in your lap. Salkey, an assistant dermatology professor at Eastern Virginia Medical School, said that under the microscope, the affected skin resembles skin damaged by long-term sun exposure. Major manufacturers including Apple, Hewlett Packard and Dell warn in user manuals against placing laptops on laps or exposed skin for extended periods of time because of the risk for burns. A medical report several years ago found that men who used laptops on their laps had elevated scrotum temperatures. If prolonged, that kind of heat can decrease sperm production, which can potentially lead to infertility. Whether laptop use itself can cause that kind of harm hasn't been confirmed. In the past, "toasted skin syndrome" has occurred in workers whose jobs require being close to a heat source, including bakers and glass blowers, and, before central heating, in people who huddled near potbellied stoves to stay warm. Dr. Anthony J. Mancini, dermatology chief at Children's Memorial Hospital in Chicago, said he'd treated a boy who developed the condition from using a heating pad "hours at a time" to soothe a thigh injured in soccer. Mancini said he'd also seen a case caused by a hot water bottle. He noted that chronic, prolonged skin inflammation can potentially increase chances for squamous cell skin cancer, which is more aggressive than the most common skin cancer. But Mancini said it's unlikely computer use would lead to cancer since it's so easy to avoid prolonged close skin contact with laptops.
I learned about this the hard way. When I first got my laptop for college I didn't have anything under it, so after 2 hours or so I'd see reddish blotches on my legs from where it was. It's also because the vent for the fans is right on the bottom of it. I splurged not long afterward on something called an X-Pad. The flat part of the pad rests on my lap, while the X-shaped part props up the laptop some so air can pass underneath. It also prevents the laptop fans from overheating.
Details are spotty on this. Does the skin have to be directly exposed? What are the statistics/probabilities on this? Not much to go on from just the article. Either way, doesn't worry me. My laptop is never on my lap, and if it is it's not blazing hot.
Ever since we got laptops in my family, I've put a pillow under the laptop when I've used it on my lap. I would think it's common sense to do something if the laptop is burning your thighs, not just sit there and surf the web while your skin gets damaged. If it hurts, most people would do something about it.
I would have thought it would have been obvious, even though I often used to keep laptops on my lap... they got painfully hot anyways. The X-Pad sounds like it would have been mighty useful, though.
Why would you keep your laptop on your lap if it started burning? My reasoning for letting things burn me happens to be that I have an iron deficiency, so I'm always freezing. Especially since I've stopped taking iron pills. So I might not realize when something is super hot. Like when I take all hot showers. :3 But other than something like that, isn't common sense kind of..Remove the hot thing before it burns you? I also don't have my laptop on my lap. Not really for my well-being but because my laptop gets hot and goes slow when it's hot. So I don't see this as that terrible an issue, really. I think people need to be more careful.
That sucks, you can get skin damage. Whenever my legs start to feel hot usually I place a long sheet/towel to cover them; cause I remember a few years back there were redish marks on my legs; nothing major but honestly I don't keep them on my legs as much unless I have no where else to place it. - But yea I agree with others if it starts to burn, - move it away.
