Erythroderma

Erythroderma also sometimes called exfoliative dermatitis, is a severe and potentially life-threatening condition that presentswith diffuse erythema and scaling involving most of the skin surface area (≥90 percent, in the most common definition). Erythrodermais a rare condition. The annual incidence has been estimated to be approximately 1 per 100,000 in the adult population.The most common cause of erythroderma is the exacerbation of a preexisting inflammatory dermatosis, most often psoriasis oratopic dermatitis. A hypersensitivity drug reaction is the second most frequent cause of erythroderma (approximately 20 percentof cases) followed by uncommon causes (T-cell lymphoma and other hematologic and systemic malignancies, immunobullousdiseases, connective tissue diseases, and infections). In approximately 25 percent of cases of erythroderma, no underlying causeis identified and erythroderma is classified as idiopathic.

Keywords: erythroderma, pathogenesis, classification, treatment