BACTERIAL DERMAL INFECTION AND FOOD ALLERGY IN CHILDREN WITH ATOPIC DERMATITIS

It has been supposed that the bacterial dermatic infection or food allergy may act as an initiator or accelerator on the attack of atopic dermatitis (AD). In this regard, in 76 children under 6 years of age with AD, the affected parts of the skin were subjected to bacterial culture to isolate infected bacteria, and the relationships between AD and bacterial infection and food allergy were examined.As the results, from the skin lesions of AD children with egg allergy, Staphylococcus spp. were isolated from 49 (89.1%) of 55 test specimens, and among them, Staphylococcus aureus was detected in 72.7% and Staphylococcus epidermidis was in 21.1%. However, from the skin of AD children without egg allergy, they were detected not in such a high frequency. This trend was more prominent in dry skin lesions.Whereas, from skin lesions so wet as accompanying erosion, irrespective of the presence or absence of egg allergy, Staphylococcus spp., particularly S. aureus was isolated in a high frequency.No the correlation was observed on the isolations of S. aureus from skin lesions of children with or without milk allergy.