SC tape‐stripping in children with AD with light and dark skin types

Abstract

Atopic dermatitis (AD, atopic eczema) is a very common skin condition affecting 10‐20% of children. It affects children of all skin colours and seems to occur more often in Asian children and children with dark skin types. However, most research is performed on children with light skin types. This study, performed in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, aimed to investigate differences between AD in children with dark and light skin types. To study this, the investigators took tape strips from 53 AD children aged 0‐12 years and 50 healthy children as control (comparison). Tape stripping is a painless procedure which is ideal to perform in children, in which a small round sticker is attached to the skin. When removing this special sticker, a thin layer of skin cells remains attached to the sticker, allowing the investigators to study several aspects of skin inflammation and skin barrier. The authors found that AD skin from children with light and dark skin have similar levels and types of skin inflammation. However, they found differences in skin barrier markers between these two groups. In light skinned children, markers of good skin barrier were lower in AD skin when compared to healthy children's skin, while in dark AD skin these skin barrier markers were not significantly different from healthy dark skin. This study showed that dark‐skinned and light‐skinned AD children are similar when it concerns skin inflammation, but in light skinned AD children the skin barrier dysfunction may play an additional role in the development of AD. This suggests that AD in light and dark skin has different mechanisms of development.