What Does Eczema Look Like?

Many people starting to deal with dermatitis ask: what does eczema look like? Why am I curious? It all started when my son experienced some unexplained redness and itching on the skin. One of my friends told me that it looked like it was eczema.

I had heard about eczema before but did not really know how it looked like exactly. I was surprised to find out there are many types of eczema, and each type may look different from the other. This is aside from the level of severity of eczema that a patient has.

After reading through many articles and consulting many sites I learned that according to the medical definition of eczema, this "skin condition" (which I now know is not true) is a type of inflammatory disease that is characterized by inflammation, vesiculation (formation of blisters), the development of crusts and scales and watery discharge.

What was more interesting was that different types of eczema can be identified according to the location of the infected area as well as the causal agent. That meant many possible causes.

Different types of eczema vary depending on how it looks but generally there are predominant symptoms common in almost all types of eczema.

Typical Symptoms

The redness of the skin is the first sign to notice which leads people to think they have eczema. This is because of the inflammation that comes with this type of "skin condition."

Then the skin becomes dry and super itchy and the more you scratch the skin, the itchier it gets.

The skin becomes so itchy that many can't sleep at all.

In many cases blisters appear because of the fluid in the small "bubbles" or because of excessive scratching.

It's also common to have bumps on the skin as well as some blisters. The bumps may be filled with pus or with watery substance. I consider myself lucky as my son's bumps were filled with water and not the disgusting pus.

Eczema can attack any part of the body however some parts like the hands are specific to the illness. Mostly patches of dry and itchy skin are visible on the face, inside of the elbows, necks, ankles and knees.

I also found out that infants are not excused from this type of skin condition. What does eczema look like with infants? Almost the same but you can usually see it on their foreheads, forearms, cheeks, scalp, legs and neck.