Dawaa Reference

chronic

Lipoma

Treatment options, dosing, cautions and Egyptian brands from the shipped Dawaa Reference card.

Evidence status

Checked against the sources named below

Sources3 sources

ICPC-3 (WONCA International Classification of Primary Care, 3rd edition) - condition scope only, no dose · Lipoma - StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK507906/ · No dose - no medicine is given for this in primary care

Verified against1 document
  • No dose - no medicine is given for this in primary care

Verified date2026-08

Presentation reference

Is it this?

Reference only, to read alongside your own examination.

Symptoms — what the patient reports (3)

  • A chest lipoma near the airway can cause breathing difficulty from bronchial blockage [breathlessness]
  • An oesophageal lipoma can cause obstruction, difficulty swallowing, regurgitation, vomiting, and reflux, with a risk of aspiration and repeat chest infections [difficulty swallowing · heartburn · regurgitation · vomiting]
  • Dercum disease causes multiple painful lipomas with overlying skin tingling, mainly in postmenopausal women [tingling]

Signs — what you find (5)

  • A soft, painless, mobile lump under the skin, with no change to the overlying skin, is typical [skin nodule]
  • Sliding a finger off the tumour edge produces a characteristic slippage sign
  • Growth is usually slow, reaching a stable final size, though some exceed 10 cm as giant lipomas
  • The trunk, neck, forearms, and upper limbs are typical sites, since lipomas prefer fat-rich skin; the hands and feet are seldom involved
  • Cardiac lipomas sit mainly under the endocardium and appear as a yellow mass bulging into the heart chamber

Tests (4)

  • Typical lipomas are diagnosed clinically, with tissue sent for histology only after complete surgical removal
  • Imaging before surgery is considered for giant size, rapid growth, pain, fixation to nearby tissue, or a deep, thigh, or retroperitoneal location
  • Most lipomas under the skin need no imaging; ultrasound, MRI, or CT is used for lesions in an unusual location
  • Soft tissue x-ray can show the fat-density lesion but is only used when the clinical diagnosis is uncertain

If not this — what else fits (12)

  • Epidermoid cysts usually have a visible surface punctum; without one they can look identical to a lipoma
  • Hibernomas are rare, slow-growing brown-fat masses, 3 to 12 cm, in the mediastinum or between the shoulder blades
  • Angiolipomas are often tender, under 2 cm, well-defined, and typically on the forearm of a teen or young adult
  • Angiomyolipomas typically occur on the hands or feet of adult men
  • Liposarcomas are typically deep tumours in the retroperitoneum or, classically, the thigh
  • Proteus syndrome combines lipomas with epidermal naevi, haemangiomas, thickened cerebriform skin on the palms and soles, bony overgrowth, and scoliosis
  • Familial multiple lipomatosis presents around the 30s with hundreds of encapsulated lipomas, inherited in an autosomal dominant pattern
  • Madelung disease causes diffuse, symmetric, painless fatty swelling of the head, neck, and shoulders, mainly in middle-aged men who drink heavily
  • Gardner syndrome adds multiple lipomas or fibromas to colon polyps and cancers, skull/jaw osteomas, and extra teeth
  • MEN type 1 combines multiple lipomas with parathyroid, pituitary, and pancreatic tumours
  • Cowden syndrome pairs multiple lipomas with oral papillomas, facial trichilemmomas, and a raised cancer risk
  • Bannayan-Riley-Ruvalcaba syndrome is a childhood form of Cowden syndrome with lipomas, intestinal hamartomas, genital freckling, a large head, and intellectual disability

SourceStatPearls "Lipoma" - disease-level clinical article

Presentation findings are traced to the source above.

1

NO DRUG THERAPY IN PRIMARY CARE (ASSESSMENT & ADVICE)

1st line
Adult dose and duration

A common benign fatty tumour presenting as a soft, mobile, painless subcutaneous lump; usually diagnosed clinically and left alone unless large, symptomatic, or cosmetically bothersome, in which case referral for excision is offered. - Assessment and advice

Paediatric dose

Children follow the same pathway: assessment, explanation and follow-up. No primary-care medicine is implied.

Dose source

No dose - no medicine is given for this in primary care

Why

A common benign fatty tumour presenting as a soft, mobile, painless subcutaneous lump; usually diagnosed clinically and left alone unless large, symptomatic, or cosmetically bothersome, in which case referral for excision is offered.

Cautions
  • No medicine is prescribed for this in primary care. The value of the consultation is recognition, explanation and follow-up, and referral if the red flags above appear.
  • RED FLAG - Pain or overlying skin changes, and rapid growth, hardness, or fixation to underlying tissue, which are atypical features suggesting a malignant fatty tumour and warrant imaging or biopsy.

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