Back of a patient with the beginnings of 'epidemic eczema'

Black and white photograph of the back of a male patient showing the first papular stage, five days from commencement of a condition termed 'epidemic eczema' by Thomas Dixon Savill, Medical Superintendant, Paddington Infirmary, London. This skin condition was a form of contagious dermatitis which Savill had observed in the Paddington Infirmary and other medical institutions in 1891. By the beginning of 1892 it was estimated that he alone had treated 163 cases from Paddington Infirmary and the adjacent workhouse. The infection would normally last seven or eight weeks and take the form of a dermatitis sometimes accompanied by the formation of vesicles, always resulting in desquamation of cuticle.