Sarcoptes scabiei x 100. (After Duhring.)
Female. Ventral surface. Male.
The disease is contagious to a marked degree, and is most commonly contracted by sleeping with those affected, or by occupying a bed in which an affected person has slept. It occurs, for obvious reasons, usually among the poor, although it is now quite frequently met with among the better classes.
State the diagnostic features of scabies.
The burrows, the peculiar distribution and the multiformity of the eruption, the progressive development, and usually a history of contagion.
How do vesicular and pustular eczema differ from scabies?
Eczema is usually limited in extent, or irregularly distributed, is distinctly patchy, with often the formation of large diffused areas; it is variable in its clinical behavior, better and worse from time to time, and differs, moreover, in the absence of burrows and of a history of contagion.
How does pediculosis corporis differ from scabies?
In the distribution of the eruption. The pediculi live in the clothing and go to the skin solely for nourishment, and hence the eruption in that condition is upon covered parts, especially those parts with which the clothing lies closely in contact, as around the neck, across the upper part of the back, about the waist and down the outside of the thighs; the hands are free.
State the prognosis of scabies.