http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26080350
Henna hazard: Chemical causes ornate allergies
Harsh dye can swell popular tattoos into itchy, blistery swirls and shapes
NEJM
A 19-year-old woman’s skin swelled and blistered after getting a black henna tattoo at a wedding, and her case report is included in this week’s New England Journal of Medicine.
By Melissa Dahl
Health writer
MSNBC
updated 5:06 a.m. PT, Fri., Aug. 8, 2008
Debbe Geiger has never been one for tattoos. But when her daughter Kim begged to get a henna tattoo on a family vacation to Cancun a few years ago, she thought it couldn’t hurt. After all, it’s only temporary, and Kim would have something to show off to her friends back home.
But just two days later, the tattoo of a cute little bug had swelled into an itchy, bubbling blister on Kim’s upper right arm.
“I was scared to death,†says Geiger, who’s 43 and lives with her family in Cary, N.C. “I thought, she’s 9 years old and she’s going to be scarred for life.â€
The American Academy of Dermatology recently issued a warning that a chemical found in black henna tattoos can cause a severe allergic reaction, causing the skin to redden, swell and blister — but only where the henna is applied, leaving people with bubbly blisters in shapes like suns, stars and flowers.
As henna body art has become mainstream in the last few years, often peddled at summer carnivals and concerts, dermatologists report increasingly treating patients, especially teen girls and young women, with these often elaborate looking allergic reactions.
“Just because they’re temporary, people think they’re safe,†says Dr. Sharon E. Jacob, a dermatologist at the University of California, San Diego.
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