ABSTRACT
Systemic contact dermatitis is an infl ammatory skin disease that may occur in contact-sensitized individuals when these persons are exposed to the hapten orally, transcutaneously, intravenously, or by inhalation. The entity can be present with clinically characteristic features or be clinically indistinguishable from other types of contact dermatitis. Contact sensitization to ubiquitous haptens is common. In a recent Danish population-based study, 15.2% reacted to one or more of the haptens in the standard patch-test series (Nielsen et al., 2001). The total number of individuals at risk of developing a systemic contact dermatitis reaction is therefore large. Systemic contact dermatitis from medicaments is a wellestablished entity. There is increasing evidence for similar reactions from plant derivatives and metals such as nickel (Hindsén et al., 2001).
