IMAGES IN EMERGENCY MEDICINE
The mark of the dragon
Department of Emergency Medicine, Salford Royal Hospital, Salford, Greater Manchester, UK
Correspondence to:
Correspondence to Dr R L Boon, Department of Emergency Medicine, Salford Royal Hospital, Stott Lane, Salford, Greater Manchester M6 8HD, UK; robboon69@hotmail.com
Accepted 20 June 2008
| The first 100% of the full text of this article appears below. |
An 8-year-old boy presented to the emergency department with a pruritic erythematous rash on his left leg in the shape of a dragon. Ten days earlier he had had a henna tattoo while on holiday in Egypt. This had washed off after approximately 3 days. Following an interval of 7 days he developed an erythematous rash affecting his leg in the exact location of the henna tattoo (fig 1).
Figure 1 Photograph showing erythematous rash in the shape of a dragon.
| |||||||||
Hypersensitivity reactions to henna tattoos have been described previously.1 2 Henna contains para-phenylenediamine which is a darkening agent that can cause hypersensitivity reactions. He was treated with topical 0.5% hydrocortisone and oral chlorpheniramine. The rash settled down within 2 weeks.
Competing interests None.
Patient consent Obtained from patient’s relative.
- Sidwell RU, Francis ND, Basarab T. Vesicular erythema multiforme-like reaction to para-phenylenediamine in a henna tattoo. Pediatr Dermatol 2008;25:201–4.[CrossRef][Medline]
- Power S, Postlethwaite RJ. An unusual rash. Arch Dis Child 2002;87:134.
[Free Full Text]
CiteULike 
Complore 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
- Full Text
- Full Text (PDF)
- Submit a response
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me when eLetters are posted
- Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
- Email this link to a friend
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Add article to my folders
- Download to citation manager
- Request Permissions
Google Scholar
PubMed
Topic Collections
Bookmark with
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
