Europe, and in particular Spain, has become the destination of a considerable number of immigrants, 50% come from Latin America. The purpose of this study was to describe the cases of dermatoses seen in the immigrant Latin American population and compare them with those found in the control Spanish population. Over a year all the visits of economic immigrants seen in the Dermatology Section of the Hospital General Universitario de Alicante were prospectively recorded. During the study period 706 Latin American patients were seen. The most frequent dermatoses were eczema (18.2%), acne (6.5%) and non-genital viral warts (6.3%). The comparative study of dermatoses adjusted for age and sex, found a greater frequency of eczema, alopecia, melasma, herpes simplex, pilar keratosis, xerosis, and scabies (p<0.01) in the Latin American population. On the other hand, melanoeytic nevi and melanoma were less frequent in these patients (p < 0.05). We may say that the skin type and socio-sanitary conditions of the Latin American immigrant population lead to a greater frequency of eczema, melasma and scabies. In addition, the skin type and younger age favour a lower frequency of skin tumours.

Europe Dermatoses Immigrant Skin color Latin america

herpes simplex tertiary health care prospective study immigrant South and Central America Latin America economics population university hospital Prospective Studies skin disease human controlled study comparative study alopecia morbidity Skin Diseases melanoma skin ethnology dermatology hygiene Humans Adolescent chi square distribution Infant, Newborn male Chi-Square Distribution preschool child Emigrants and Immigrants Infant risk factor Risk Factors Child, Preschool newborn Spain female eczema keratosis xerosis melanocytic nevus Article scabies adult migration verruca vulgaris Case-Control Studies chloasma skin tumor case control study sex acne Child