Fungating iododerma treated with hydrocortisone.

Abstract

Most clinicians consider iodides as common, useful, and innocuous substances. In therapy they may be administered orally, topically, and intravenously. Organic iodides find frequent use as contrast mediums in radiology. Even when they are used in moderate dosage for short periods of time, however, symptoms of iodism may appear; these include coryza, edema of the lids, tenderness, submental and submaxillary nodal enlargement, salivation, and abdominal distention. The production of cutaneous lesions may also occur with or without systemic symptoms of iodism. The most widely known dermatological manifestations of iodism are pustular lesions. Less commonly recognized lesions may be erythematous, urticarial, vesicular, bullous, papulopustular, anthracoid, carbuncular, petechial, or nodular. The grouping and coalescence of pustular lesions produce unusually large nodular or papillomatous flat lesions. Some few cases are reported in which fungating tumors are found that produce a picture not unlike that of mycosis fungoides. Rosenthal, in 1901, described a case