RARE DISEASERESEARCH ATLAS
Open navigation menu

ORPHA:157997

Benign cephalic histiocytosis

high confidenceDisorder

Publications

106

52th percentile

Trials

0

Interventional, condition-specific

Researchers

475

Distinct authors in sample

Gene link

—

Readiness

2/6

Stages with a signal

Clinical definition (Orphanet)

A rare non-Langerhans cell histiocytosis characterized by multiple small yellowish-red or brown papules initially erupting predominantly in the head and neck region. The histopathological hallmark of these eventually self-healing lesions is a dermal proliferation of histiocytes with intracytoplasmic comma-shaped bodies, coated vesicles, and desmosome-like structures. Birbeck granules are absent. The disease typically occurs in young children.

How rare: <1 / 1 000 000 — fewer than one in a million. In a city the size of Kolkata, that might mean on the order of fifteen people.

Orphanet entry

Cross-references

Joined from Mondo / Orphanet. MeSH labels may enter searches; UMLS / OMIM / NCIT are stored for reference.

Research stages

Trial readiness signals

Where this condition sits on an open-data research pipeline — not how close a treatment is, and not medical advice. Empty stages often mean “not in these databases under this Mondo ID,” not “impossible.”

2/6 stages with a signal

No specific-condition interventional trial, but broader-category trials exist — discuss eligibility with a clinician.

  1. Gene identifiedNot found

    No GenCC disease–gene assertion in this build

  2. LiteraturePresent

    106 matched papers (46 in last 10 years) Source

  3. Phenotype characterisedNot checked

    Not yet enriched from Monarch / HPO

  4. Animal modelNot checked

    Not yet enriched from Monarch / Alliance

  5. Orphan designationNot checked

    FDA/EMA orphan-drug designation not enriched yet

  6. Interventional trialPartial

    None under the specific name; 68 for broader category histiocytosis

Biology

Genes and phenotypes

Gene–disease validity from GenCC, plus phenotypes and animal models joined from Monarch Initiative via Mondo ID — not a clinical diagnosis aid.

Do we know what causes it?

Not yet — the cause hasn't been pinned down in GenCC.

No strong gene–disease assertion joined for this Orphanet entity.

Phenotypes (Monarch / HPO)

Not enriched in this build — Monarch phenotype joins were not run for this record.

Animal models (Monarch / Alliance)

Not enriched in this build.

Literature

Is anyone studying this?

106

106 papers have ever been published on this condition (under this name). For scale, breast cancer has over 700,000. Median papers in the last 10 years for a rare disease in this dataset (publications denominator n=5449) is 41.

106 papers since the earliest indexed year in this search — median last-10-year count for a rare disease in this dataset is 41 (publications denominator n=5449).

46 in the last 10 years · high confidence · 52th percentile (publications denominator)

Phrase hits: 106 · MeSH hits: 0

Open Europe PMC search

Who's working on it?

475

Distinct author names in 106 sampled papers — named people below.

Who's working on it?

No interventional trial matched this name; these authors publish on it in the sampled literature — a practical starting point for contact.

  1. 01
    Emile JF3 papers · 2022

    Research Unit EA4340, Versailles University, Paris-Saclay University, Boulogne, France; Pathology Department, Ambroise Paré Hospital, Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Paris (AP-HP), Boulogne, France;

    Papers in Europe PMC
  2. 02
    Fraitag S3 papers · 2022

    Pathology Department, Necker Hospital, Paris, France;

    Papers in Europe PMC
  3. 03
    Lange M3 papers · 2023

    Department of Dermatology, Venereology, and Allergology, Medical University of Gdansk, Gdansk, Poland.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  4. 04
    Abdel-Wahab O2 papers · 2021

    Leukemia Service, Human Oncology and Pathogenesis Program, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY;

    Papers in Europe PMC
  5. 05
    Barsky S2 papers · 1985
    Papers in Europe PMC
  6. 06
    Caputo R2 papers · 1993
    Papers in Europe PMC
  7. 07
    Cerio R2 papers · 2005
    Papers in Europe PMC
  8. 08
    Diamond EL2 papers · 2022

    Department of Neurology, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY;

    Papers in Europe PMC
  9. 09
    Donadieu J2 papers · 2021

    Research Unit EA4340, Versailles University, Paris-Saclay University, Boulogne, France; Pediatric Hematology, Trousseau Hospital, APHP, Paris, France;

    Papers in Europe PMC
  10. 10
    Duran-McKinster C2 papers · 2006
    Papers in Europe PMC

Clinical research

Is a treatment being tested?

0

interventional trials for this specific condition

No interventional trial testing a treatment matched this specific condition name on ClinicalTrials.gov (observational studies and pan-disease registries are listed separately when present). 68 trials are registered for histiocytosis, the broader category — shown separately because they may or may not enrol this specific subtype.

Data as of 27 July 2026

No matched interventional trials. This is true for 73% of diseases in the trials denominator (5114 of 7003). Here are the researchers publishing on it.

high confidence · 36.5th percentile (trials denominator)

Recruiting interventional trials

From the matched ClinicalTrials.gov set

No interventional trial testing a treatment was found for this specific condition name on ClinicalTrials.gov.

68 interventional trials matched histiocytosis, the broader category — listed below. Those studies are not counted in the condition-specific total.

Broader category: histiocytosis

68

Interventional trials for the parent category, exclusive of NCT IDs already counted above. Eligibility for this subtype is not guaranteed.

Worth raising with a clinician. How we count trials.

Recruiting under the broader category

Where to find support

We do not yet link condition-specific patient organisations. These umbrella groups support undiagnosed and ultra-rare families:

India — NPRD

Last verified 2026-07-26

This ORPHAcode is not on our curated NPRD list (direct or Mondo-parent match). That does not decide clinical eligibility; families in India should ask a notified Centre of Excellence about current coverage.

Hand-curated for this project. ORPHAcode mappings are best-effort and may be incomplete or imprecise for umbrella categories. Parent (Mondo) matches mean the policy lists a broader category — confirm eligibility with a Centre of Excellence. Financial entitlements summarised from public policy statements and may change. This is not official government guidance.

How we counted this

Europe PMC query (preferred label + any corrected label + Orphanet and Mondo exact synonyms, stoplisted; unioned with resolved MeSH labels when available). UMLS / OMIM / NCIT cross-references are stored on the overview but are not added to the query string.

"Benign cephalic histiocytosis"

Run this search on Europe PMC

ClinicalTrials.gov query (quoted phrases + MeSH via query.cond, plus recall-expansion terms when used):

"Benign cephalic histiocytosis"

Study-type breakdown: 0 interventional · 0 observational · 0 expanded access. Only interventional studies enter the trial headline.

Parent-category trials query:

"histiocytosis"

Query health: ok — strategies attempted: phrase; with hits: phrase

Run this search on ClinicalTrials.gov

Confidence reasoning

  • Preferred label is multi-word and distinctive
  • No synonyms dropped by stoplist
  • No label/synonym collisions with other diseases in this corpus

Ingested 2026-07-27T08:04:16.943Z