Clinical Study of 12 Cases with Chronic Actinic Dermatitis

Won, Chong Hyun; Youn, Jai Il

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Chronic actinic dermatitis (CAD) has been defined using three criteria: clinical photobiological and histological aspects. CAD is a rare disease with only a few clinical analyses reported in Korea.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to investigate the clinical characteristics of CAD including epidemiology, clinical presentations and results of phototests in Korean patients.
METHODS
A retrospective analysis was conducted according to patients' medical records at Seoul National University Hospital.
RESULTS
Twelve patients were enrolled in this study. Most were elderly men with skin lesions on the sun-exposed areas. The mean age was 55. 4 years. Ten patients were male and the other 2 were female. The mean duration of the disease was 12.7 years. Phototests showed that 6 patients showed decreased minimal erythema dose (MED) to UVA and 2 patients decreased MED to UVB. The remaining 4 patients decreased to both UVA and UVB.
CONCLUSION
The most common abnormal phototest results were decreased MED to UVA. More patients showed normal MED to UVB in this study compared with other studies. Our study analyzed the clinical and photobiological characteristics of CAD in Korean patients.