Dermatitis
What is Dermatitis?
Dermatitis refers to a group of itchy inflammatory conditions that cause changes to the skin.
Dermatitis can be classified in different ways.
- By what has caused it eg, contact with an irritating agent or by exposure to UV
- By clinical appearance when your doctor sees it eg discoid eczema
- By where it usually occurs eg, hand, eyelid, or lower leg dermatitis
In many cases, multiple factors may all be contributing to the issue.
The terms dermatitis and eczema are often used interchangeably but while all eczema is a dermatitis, not all dermatitis is eczema.
- Dermatitis, strictly speaking, includes any cause of skin inflammation affecting the skin surface.
- Eczema is derived from the Greek word for “to boil or bubble over”, which can be seen as swelling within the skin surface.
Who gets dermatitis?
Dermatitis is common, affecting about one in every five persons at some stage in their life.
Different types of dermatitis are more common at different stages of life, for example:
- Atopic dermatitis and pityriasis alba are more common in children
- Hand eczema is more common in young and middle-aged adults
Who gets dermatitis?
Dermatitis is common, affecting about one in every five persons at some stage in their life.
Different types of dermatitis are more common at different stages of life, for example:
- Atopic dermatitis and pityriasis alba are more common in children
- Hand eczema is more common in young and middle-aged adults
What might you see with dermatitis?
Dermatitis may be either a new occurrence(acute) or persistent(chronic).
- Acute dermatitis will show redness or swelling, oozing and weeping, and even blistering.
- Chronic eczema will show skin thickening, scaling, and hyperpigmentation.
- Redness may be more difficult to see in darker skin types.
- Post-inflammatory hypo- and hyperpigmentation are more frequent in darker skin types.
Treatment of Dermatitis
It is important to recognise that as with most skin disorders, this may be a new condition that may be easily managed if caught and treated early, or it may be a chronic persistent condition that may need management with periods of stability but won’t ever be cured.
Patience is needed, as is willingness to follow instructions.
The biggest factor for persisting symptoms is usually a failure by patients to understand that longterm lifestyle changes need to occur to manage their dermatitis and there’s no quick fix.
Photos attributed to dermnet.nz.org