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A rapid and definitive diagnosis of kerosene dermatitis by an analysis of detached lesional epidermis using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry.

Tsujino Y, Hieda Y, Morita E

Department of Dermatology, Shimane University Faculty of Medicine, 89-1 Enya, Izumo, Shimane, 693-8501, Japan, ytsujino@med.shimane-u.ac.jp.

A 73-year-old woman, who suffered from erythema with bullae and pustules on her abdomen and anterior right thigh, visited our hospital without an awareness of the causative agents. The lesions appeared like first and second degree burns. The small amount of detached roof of bulla was sampled without skin biopsy before the ointment treatment. The sample was sonicated in an ultrasonic bath for 1 min in n-pentane, and then 1 mul of the extract was analyzed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The causative agent was determined to be kerosene. An examination of blood samples collected at the first visit failed to detect kerosene, though traces of trimethylbenzene were detected. A GC-MS analysis of the small sample of lesional epidermis was very useful to identify kerosene as a causative agent.

Published 11 October 2005 in Arch Dermatol Res, 297(2): 91-3.
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