Chronic Nonhereditary Blistering Disease in Children

Abstract

The chronic nonhereditary blistering diseases (pemphigus, bullous pemphigoid, dermatitis herpetiformis) have been reported or observed in children, and examples have been studied immunologically. Fluorescent staining has revealed characteristic immunologic changes in children with pemphigus and with bullous pemphigoid; no immunologic findings have been reported in patients with papulovesicular dermatitis herpetiformis or so-called bullous pemphigoid of childhood. This last entity, initially thought to represent bullous pemphigoid or a bullous form of dermatitis herpetiformis, may best be separated from both of these diseases, and better referred to as "benign chronic bullous dermatosis of childhood."