Dermatite allergica da contatto da colliri: procedimento diagnostico

The diagnosis of allergic contact dermatitis from ophthalmic products is often discouraging as patch tests with patients' own products are often negative. In fact, only 19-23% of patients strongly suspected of having allergic contact dermatitis from ophthalmic products are positive to their own products tested in the classical way. Alternative procedures of performing patch tests with topical ophthalmic medicaments have been proposed with the aim of increasing the sensitivity of the test. The enlargement of the patch test area provides more positive patch tests results when testing particular standardized allergens and detects weak sensitizations. Stripping and scratching, damaging the cutaneous barrier may lead to an increased absorption of the allergen enhancing its percutaneous penetration. Both these techniques have been successfully experimented with ophthalmic products. Sodium lauryl sulphate (SLS) is an anionic surface-active agent capable of damaging the cutaneous barrier. Pre-...