Content - Volume 71, Issue 1

A 39-year-old woman with demarcated wrinkled areas, histologically characterized by absence of elastic fibers in the middle and upper reticular dermis, is described. Immunoreactivity of vitronectin and amyloid P component, present at the periphery of elastic fibers in normal skin in adults, was absent from the middermis of lesional skin as were orcein stained fibers. C9 neoantigen immunoreactivity ...

1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 (1,25(OH)2D3) is suggested to be involved in the regulation of keratinocyte proliferation and differentiation. Recent evidence also indicates its potential value for the treatment of psoriasis, where the alteration of various transmembrane signalling systems has been well documented. Using porcine epidermis, we investigated the effect of 1,25(OH)2D3 on adenylate cyclase an ...

IgE-binding components in crude extracts of Pityrosporum orbiculare were separated by sodium dodecylsulphate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and transferred to Immobilon membrane. The components were detected by P. orbiculare radioallergosorbent (RAST) positive sera (class 2-4) from 37 patients with atopic dermatitis and visualized by enzyme-labelled anti-human IgE antibodies in chromogenic sub ...

Skin biopsies from the area of the medial malleolus of 24 patients with chronic venous insufficiency, of 5 patients without signs or history of chronic venous insufficiency and of seven corpses without manifestation of chronic venous insufficiency, were sectioned and stained with hematoxylin and eosin and with Ki-67, a monoclonal antibody expressed in the nuclei of proliferating cells. Hematoxylin ...

Sixty-three children with severe atopic dermatitis aged 0.4 to 14.8 years, were treated with a diet eliminating all but six foods for a 6-week period. Nine (14%) abandoned the diet before 6 weeks had elapsed. Twenty-one (33%) completed the diet but did not benefit. Thirty-three (52%) patients obtained greater than or equal to 20% improvement in the disease severity score at 6 weeks, and for these ...

The author presents original data obtained when using the dry skin prick test method to introduce histamine into the skin and by non-invasive evaluation of the skin blood flow changes at various sites/times during the development of the weal and flare reaction. The test method (1-second prick test duration and evaluation with laser Doppler flowmetry) generated reproducible responses when repeated ...

The hairless mouse has been used as a model to distinguish between local and systemic atrophogenic effects of topical steroids. Hydrocortisone-17-butyrate, betamethasone-17-valerate, budesonide and clobetasol-17-propionate were applied topically daily for 21 days. Skinfold thickness and dermal DNA synthesis of treated and untreated skin were evaluated as parameters of local and systemic atrophogen ...

Squamous cell carcinomas were induced by UVB in the hairless mouse HRO hr/hr. Twelve mice were irradiated three times a week at a dose of 0.19 J/cm2. The average latency period for the appearance of the first tumour is 16 weeks and by the 21st week, tumour incidence is 100%. Further observation of these tumours shows that their growth is independent of irradiation dose and that the tumours continu ...

Salicylic acid has been widely used in the topical treatment of psoriasis. Chemically it is closely related to paraaminobenzoic acid. Following in vitro studies indicating that salicylic acid might exhibit relevant UVB absorption, we found that salicylic acid had a clinically pronounced filter effect when applied prior to UVB exposure. The duration of photoprotection after application was more tha ...

Two lines of murine melanoma cells (B16 and Cloudman S91) were cultured on type I collagen gel and the effects of all-trans-retinoic acid on the growth and infiltration into the gel were assayed. In both lines, proliferation and the degree of infiltration were suppressed by the addition of all-trans-retinoic acid. The infiltration-inhibiting effect was expressed very rapidly and was dose-dependent ...

We investigated the effectiveness of very low doses of the contact sensitizer dinitrofluorobenzene in sensitizing BALB/cJ mice. Surprisingly, the ear swelling reactions were greater with lower dinitrofluorobenzene doses, down to one-twentieth of doses commonly used. Although it is common practice to use much lower doses at challenge than at sensitization, we found greater reactions with lower dose ...

Intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM-1) is a membrane-bound glycoprotein that is a ligand for lymphocyte function-associated antigen-1 (LFA-1) and is important for a number of cell adhesions in immune reactions. The molecule is expressed by several cell types (e.g. macrophages, endothelial cells, keratinocytes, melanoma cells and cell lines) and there are some indications that expression of thi ...

Increasing doses of capsaicin were applied topically to the forearm skin of 30 patients with psoriasis, 16 patients with systemic scleroderma and 16 healthy volunteers. Only one-third of the patients with psoriasis responded with neurogenic inflammation to capsaicin doses of 0.125 and 0.25 microgram/cm2 in contrast to 81% of scleroderma patients and all the normal controls, who showed a positive c ...

Pericapillary fibrin cuffs are probably involved in the pathogenesis of venous leg ulcers. Factor XIII (Fibrin stabilizing factor) is of importance in wound healing. Its activity, which may affect ulceration, was found to be significantly reduced in the blood of venous leg ulcer patients and in post-phlebitic patients, compared with healthy controls.

A 10-year-old boy with T. violaceum tinea capitis was given systemic ketoconazole therapy. After 4 weeks' treatment, liver enzymes had increased considerably. Ketoconazole treatment was stopped and 3 weeks later the values had returned to normal. Three weeks thereafter the patient was completely cured and no relapses have occurred.

Lipophagic panniculitis consists of a macrophage infiltrate in the subcutaneous tissue. The macrophages transform into foam cells within the panniculus; they replace lipocytes and may form giant cells. Although those pathologic features have been described as diagnostic of Weber-Christian disease, we report the occurrence of lipophagic panniculitis in re-excision specimens. Among 252 re-excision s ...

The authors describe a 74-year-old man who presented with a 2-cm nodule on the ventral face of the penis, showing histologically a cyst lined by both epidermal and urethroid epithelium. The authors discuss the various histological forms of raphe median cysts of the penis.

Sixteen adult renal transplant patients and 20 non-transplant patients with warts underwent intralesional therapy with bleomycin sulphate. One unit/ml bleomycin sulphate was injected in 93 warts in renal transplant recipients and 100 warts in non-transplant patients with proven resistance to conventional treatment for at least 6 months. The treatment was compared with a normal saline placebo injec ...

A 53-year-old male developed prurigo pigmentosa on his back, after undergoing acupuncture for 3 years. The eruptions were ceased on discontinuing the therapy but recurred with its resumption. The acupuncture needle contained 18.12% chromium. Erythema was induced by patch testing with potassium dichromate, and a flare-up was observed in the area of the patch test on resumption of acupuncture. We co ...

This is a report of 2 patients with pigmented purpuric dermatosis treated successfully with Psoralen photochemotherapy (PUVA). Treatment for pigmented purpuric dermatosis is generally unsatisfactory, and we believe this to be the first report of successful response of this condition to PUVA.

Two different red pigments used for tattooing were found to give rise to inflammatory reactions in the skin. No inorganic component was found in the pigments. NMR and MS analyses elucidated the molecular structures of two different organic compounds. A bright red pigment was found to be an aromatic azo-derivative, and a red-violet pigment was found to be linear quinacridone. A strong exposure to U ...

A case of leukocytoclastic vasculitis in a 24-year-old woman is described. A severe eruption of vasculitis occurred after placebo-controlled oral challenge with 50 mg ponceau. The patient was asked to adhere to a diet free from food additives, and the vasculitis faded after a period of 2 months.

A positive pathergy test in patients with Behçet's disease has been accepted as a diagnostic criterion by many authors, but in recent years it has been claimed that the test has a decreased positivity. We have examined the test in 92 proven cases of Behçet's disease, using 20G and 26G disposable needles and evaluated them after 48 h. Maximum positivity was found to be 65% when we used needles of ...

A 41-year-old woman presented with the typical clinical and pathohistological features of acute febrile neutrophilic dermatosis (AFND). The disease had been preceded by diarrhoea and vomiting for 2 weeks. Stool cultures proved positive for Salmonella typhimurium infection. Antibiotic therapy and tapering oral steroids led to a complete remission of skin lesions within 2 weeks. To our knowledge, th ...

Moisturizers are believed to improve the skin condition by increasing the water content of the stratum corneum. A variety of techniques for assessing skin hydration has been developed. In the present study the capacitance following a single application of different moisturizers to normal skin on 12 volunteers was measured with the commercial available Corneometer 420. The moisturizers were pure pe ...

A 59-year-old patient suffered from persistent angioedema-like swellings and blood eosinophilia. The disease was preceded by an erythema multiforme-like exanthema and urticarial papules. Persistent eosinophilia with exclusion of its known causes and skin biopsy helped to establish the diagnosis of the benign variant of hypereosinophilic syndrome known as 'episodic angioedema with eosinophilia'. Co ...

The ascertainment of consistent diurnal variations in human epidermal cell proliferation may have important implications for the treatment of many skin diseases. For the evaluation of diurnal rhythms in the growth of human epidermis, skin biopsies were taken every 4th hour for 48 h from each of two persons under synchronized living conditions. The epidermal cell proliferation was assessed by the f ...