A Review of infantile acrodynia ('pink disease')

Abstract

A study of published cases of acrodynia and personal experience of a further 31, leads to the conclusion that this disease of infancy and early childhood should be regarded as a form of encephalopathy; the complex clinical picture can be satisfactorily explained by disturbed function of the hypothalamus, and the term diencephalopathy is suggested as a convenient descriptive term. The aetiology is still unknown and the possibility is discussed that this may be a primary emotional disorder. Attention is called to symptomatic resemblances between acrodynia in the infant and neuro-dermato-myositis in the adult.