grows in my child's earlobe

My daughter is 10 and is getting hit by puberty rather hard. She has very oily skin on her face and black heads galore on her nose. I noticed that she was getting unpleasant zits in her earlobe at the top. Twice I squeezed them with qtips and a LOT of whitish/yellow puss and blood came out. She said it was painful when I did that so the third time I noticed one developing, I left it alone. It grew bigger and bigger until it was almost as big as a pea!! It looked like a blood blister. I carefully lanced it with a sanitized needle and gently let it drain. Once again, a lot of blood and puss. This can NOT be normal!!  Any advice on how to prevent these in the future would be greatly appreciated.
  We were at the hospital yesterday because of inner ear pain, I asked the Dr to look at the boil on her ear and she just shrugged it off as if it was normal. She was diagnosed with swimmers ear, but the growth has been going on for the last few months now before this developed.

[Bhupinder Kaur, MD]

Hello,
The symptoms are suggestive of sebaceous cyst. A sebaceous cyst is a closed sac occurring just under the skin which contains a "pasty" or "cheesy" looking substance called keratin.They may occur anywhere on body but scalp, ears, back, face, and upper arm, are common sites for sebaceous cysts. Blocked sebaceous glands, swollen hair follicles and excessive testosterone production will cause such cysts.

Generally no treatment is required but they become painful then it means they are infected, then surgical excision by traditional wide excision, minimal excision, and punch biopsy excision may be required.

It is very difficult to precisely confirm a diagnosis without examination and investigations and the answer is based on the medical information provided. For exact diagnosis, you are requested to consult your doctor. I sincerely hope that helps. Take care and please do keep me posted on how you are doing.