title: A Study of Correlation Between Clinical and Histopathological Findings of Erythroderma in North Bengal Population.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Erythroderma is a reaction pattern characterized by erythema and desquamation of 90% or more body surface area along with some metabolic alterations.
  
  
  METHODS
  Here we studied 32 patients of erythroderma at of North Bengal Medical College for a period of 1 year to find the etiology, clinical features and histological changes. Detailed history was taken from all the patients followed by relevant biochemical investigations and histological examination. To correlate the clinical and histopathological findings chi square test was used.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Male preponderance was present and most of them were in the 4(th) or 5(th) decade. Etiologically the patients were divided into secondary erythroderma developing over pre-existing dermatoses, and idiopathic erythroderma. Secondary erythroderma (n = 24) cases outnumbered the idiopathic cases (n = 8). Among the pre-existing dermatoses, psoriasis was found to be the most common etiologic agent. Apart from erythema the other common presenting features were scaling and itching. Histopathological categorization was possible in 59.3% cases, rest of the cases showed non-specific dermatitis. The most common histopathologic diagnosis was psoriasis (21.8% of cases).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our study of clinicopathological correlation of erythroderma patients among north bengal population corroborates with most of the previous studies done in other areas. As ours is a cross-sectional study in a undefined population so we could not determine the true incidence of erythroderma in north bengal population. We might have missed lymphoma as a cause of erythroderma in idiopathic cases due to lack of long follow-up, so we understand that further studies over a defined population with long follow-up is needed to determine the true incidence and causes of idiopathic erythroderma.
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, STD and Leprosy Malda Medical College, Burdwan, West Bengal, India.
authors.forename: Sabyasachi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Banerjee
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, Asansol SD Hospital, Burdwan, West Bengal, India.
authors.forename: Swarup
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ghosh
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, STD, and Leprosy, North Bengal Medical College, Darjeeling, West Bengal, India.
authors.forename: Rajesh Kumar
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Mandal
keywords: Clinical; correlation; erythroderma; histopathology