Eczema cases rise 40 per cent in four years
Date: 23 March 2009
Source: Telegraph.co.uk
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Cases of the painful skin condition eczema have risen more than 40 per cent in just four years, partly because of the modern obsession with using soap and detergents, experts have warned.
Researchers said that the complaint, in which the skin becomes inflamed and starts to shed, was now one of the most common chronic condition in England.
Often excruciatingly painful in its own right, the condition has also been linked to other illnesses such as asthma.
An estimated 5.8 million people in England suffered from eczema in 2005, a 42 per cent increase on 2001, according to the study, published in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine.
The researchers, led by Professor Aziz Sheikh from the University of Edinburgh, said that they expected the number of sufferers to continue to rise.
Environmental factors, including the "frequency of bathing and use of soaps and detergents", may have contributed to the rise, along with better awareness and diagnosis.
The study found that in 2005 almost one in nine people had, at some point in their lives, suffered from eczema.
Most commonly affected were children between the ages of five and nine.
With the rise in cases also came an increase in prescriptions to combat the disease, the study found, rising by 57 per cent to an estimated 13.7 million by 2005.
Prof Sheikh, chairman of the allergy and respiratory research group at the University of Edinburgh, said: "What's quite striking is the very high proportion of people who are getting eczema, it's an incredibly common disorder.
"Eczema is now one of the most chronic conditions to effect the English population.
"Why eczema is important is increasingly we think eczema is a herald condition for individuals to go on to develop other allergic conditions, such as asthma and allergic rhinitis."
Many children grow out of the disease, but some will continue to suffer for the rest of their lives.
Margaret Cox, chief executive of the National Eczema Society, said that the rise could have levelled off, but agreed that the modern obsession with cleanliness could have led to the increase.
"Water use dries up the skin and soaps and detergents decrease the skin," she said.
"We are using quite a lot of these products from an early age."
The study looked at the GP records of more than nine million patients.
Parents who cut foods from their children's diets to fight eczema could be doing more harm than good, experts have warned.
Scientists believe that many young sufferers could be affected by food related allergies.
But researchers at the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care said that eliminating certain foods from diets was helpful only when a child has a child had a proven allergy.
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