Allergic Eczema - Symptoms, Causes, Diagnosis and Treatment

Allergic eczema appears in individuals who have a family history of allergy. Besides eczema, they may be have other manifestations of allergies such as asthma or seasonal sneezing as well.

Symptoms

With children, it begins in the first year of life. The skin on the cheeks, scalp and at the creases of the body is dry and cracked. Because of itching and irritation, it is red and sometimes oozing.

Initial lesions consist of dryness and redness over the skin with uniform pinhead-size eruptions. There is an oozing of serum from these lesions.

Crusts form oozing vesicles there and the whole area gets infected with bacteria, producing pus. At this stage, the child not only has irritation locally but may also have a general reaction in the body in the form of fever.

If the eruptions become chronic are aggravated by continued rubbing and scratching, swelling and thickening of the skin may result. Chronic lesions darken the colour of the skin as well.

Causes

Causes of allergic eczema may be susceptibility to certain foods, pollens and dusts or to certain substances with which the skin comes in contact, and in latent allergens in adults. Wool and nylon clothes are also known to aggravate the lesions in some cases.

Among factors which often have an unfavourable influence on the course of the disease are rapid changes in temperature, emotional tensions, dusty environments, alkaline cleansing agents, including common toilet, soaps, contact with greasy topical medicaments and infections like cold and sinusitis. Diseases associated with high fever, however, often exert a temporary beneficial action.

Diagnosis

Diagnosis of the attending allergies, in these cases is very important in order to cure the condition. This is done by means of clinical tests for avoidance and re-exposure to the suspected items.

Treatment

Keeping the skin moist through applications of creams, oils and ointments is helpful.

Antihistaminic creams also reduce itching and in severe cases, application of ointments containing corticosteroids proves helpful. Some of the commonly used substances that cause this reactions and the site of reaction are as follows!

Substance ---> Site

Stocking, shoes, chappals, clothing ---> Feet legs + body
Plants, vegetables detergents, kerosene oil ---> Hands
Deodorant ---> Armpits
Necklace ---> Neck
Lipstick ---> Lips
Nose Drops ---> Nose and area the nose
Spectacles ---> Bridge of the nose
Earrings ---> Earlobes
Eye cosmetics ---> Eyelids and area around the eyes
Hair Dyes ---> Forehead, behind the ears and back of the neck, scalp

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