This is often accompanied by scarring, inflammation, and blood vessel changes – giving both the clinical and histologic impression of a melanoma or a severe dysplastic nevus.

When the patient is reexamined years later without the assistance of the original biopsy report, the physician will often require the removal of the scar with the recurrent nevus to assure that a melanoma is not missed.

The great disadvantage, seen years later is the numerous scallop scars, and a very difficult to deal with lesions called a "recurrent melanocytic nevus".

What has happened is that many "shave" excisions does not adequately penetrate the dermis or subcutaneous fat enough to include the entire melanocytic lesion.

The combination of scarring, inflammation, blood vessels, and atypical pigmented streaks seen in these recurrent nevus gives the perfect dermatoscopic picture of a melanoma.