Hand dermatitis: a 6-year experience in a tertiary referral Brazilian hospital.

Background: Hand dermatitis (HD) is a prevalent inflammatory skin disease with a significant socioeconomic impact.

Objectives: To characterize the population of HD patients followed up at the Department of Dermatology of a tertiary hospital.

Methods: A cross-sectional, retrospective and descriptive study was carried out through the analysis of medical records of HD patients assisted at the Allergy Clinic of the Department of Dermatology, Hospital das Clínicas, Faculdade de Medicina, Universidade de São Paulo, between March 1, 2016 and August 31, 2022.

Results: Of the 175 patients, 73.3% were women, and the mean age at the onset of the condition was 41.7 years. There was a statistically significant association between occupation categories and the presence of occupational dermatitis. Cases were classified as irritant contact dermatitis (49.7%), allergic contact dermatitis (57.1%) and endogenous vesicular HD (3.4%). It was observed a statistically significant higher frequency of patch tests positivity for methylchloroisothiazolinone and methylisothiazolinone (MCI/MI) and nickel sulfate in women and for potassium bichromate and carba mix in men. DLQI was assessed in 77 patients, and the average score was 7.8 points.

Study limitations: As limitations, the authors point out data collection from medical records, which lacked some information. Furthermore, as this was a cross-sectional study, it was not possible to assess cause-and-effect relationships between the variables.

Conclusions: The present data reinforces the importance of patch tests in HD investigation and highlights the high sensitivity rates to MCI/MI and nickel sulfate in Brazilian women and to potassium bichromate and carba mix in Brazilian men patients.