Climatotherapy of atopic dermatitis at the Dead Sea: demographic evaluation and cost-effectiveness.
Int J Dermatol
; 39(1): 59-69, 2000 Jan.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-10651969
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
About 21% of the patients coming yearly to the DMZ Clinic at the Dead Sea for climatotherapy suffer from atopic dermatitis. This is a common, chronic, and relapsing disease which necessitates drug treatment (topical corticosteroids, antimicrobials, antihistamines, or immunomodulators), phototherapy, or climatotherapy. Objective and methods As the improvement in the condition of patients after 4 weeks of climatotherapy at the Dead Sea is remarkable, we undertook to evaluate the demographic factors that have the strongest impact on this beneficial effect, in adults and children. The major factors studied were gender, previous medical history, previous stays at the Dead Sea, skin type, skin involvement, age, and duration of treatment. Results A retrospective study of 1718 patients revealed that previous treatments at the Dead Sea and stays longer than 4 weeks caused a clearance greater than 95%, the length of sun exposure was no longer than 5 h daily, and there was no impact of the percentage of skin involvement on the clearance of patients staying more than 4 weeks.CONCLUSION:
s Climatotherapy of atopic dermatitis at the Dead Sea is a highly effective modality for treating this disease. It is also a highly cost-effective method, as the patients take no medications and experience no side-effects. Successful climatotherapy of atopic dermatitis requires strict medical supervision throughout the whole length of the patient's stay on shore.
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Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Métodos Terapêuticos e Terapias MTCI:
Terapias_mente_y_cuerpo
/
Relajacion
Assunto principal:
Climatoterapia
/
Dermatite Atópica
/
Helioterapia
Tipo de estudo:
Health_economic_evaluation
/
Observational_studies
País/Região como assunto:
Asia
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Int J Dermatol
Ano de publicação:
2000
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Israel