title: [Nikolsky and his sign].
abstract: Piotr Vasiliyevich Nikolsky (1858-1940) trained as a dermatologist and venereologist in Kiev. In 1898 he was appointed to the chair at the University of Warsaw, which moved to Rostov on the Don during the First World War. In his doctoral dissertation of 1896 he described the sign now named after him; in patients with pemphigus foliaceus, gentle rubbing of the skin causes crinkling because the superficial layer (stratum corneum) slides over the deeper layer. The same phenomenon was soon found in patients with pemphigus vulgaris, which is more common. The sign is absent in about 60% of patients with these conditions. It is also absent in patients with pemphigoid diseases, because in these patients it is the splitting of deeper layers of the skin that causes blistering.
authors.affiliation: Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Geneeskunde, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. jan@vangijn.com
authors.forename: Jan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: van Gijn
authors.forename: Joost P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Gijselhart
mesh_terms: D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D010392:Pemphigus / Q000266:history* / Q000473:pathology; D012426:Russia