STANDARD PATCH TESTS IN ECZEMA AND DERMATITIS.

IT has been shown that patch tests performed with a routine series of potential allergens give more positive reactions on a group of eczematous subjects than they do on a similar group of normal controls (Jaeger, 1923 ; Bloch and Jaeger, 1931). Moreover, patients with contact dermatitis tend to give more positives than those suffering from constitutional eczema (Rostenberg and Sulzberger, 1937). It has therefore been presumed that the epidermis of eczematous subjects shows some degree of polysensitivity to contact allergens which is most pronounced in those suffering from contact dermatitis. However, the substances which give these positive reactions do not always produce clinical skin disease under ordinary conditions of exposure (Sulzberger, 1940) and some positives may be explained as restilting from a lower tlu-eshold of general reactivity in eczematized than in normal skins (Morris, 1953).