Study Shows High Rate of Eczema Type Overlap: Daily Dose

Patient Care brings primary care clinicians a lot of medical news every day—it’s easy to miss an important study. The Daily Dose provides a concise summary of one of the website's leading stories you may not have seen.

On March 21, 2025, we reported on a study published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology that was designed to analyze the prevalence and co-occurrence of different forms of eczema and the total number of eczema diagnoses per patient in a large, national patient database.

The study

Researchers analyzed deidentified electronic health records (EHRs) from the National Institutes of Health’s All of Us (AoU) Research Program, identifying eczema cases using standard medical classification codes. The database contained 25 672 adults (63% White, 62.9% women) with at least 1 eczema diagnosis.

The findings

Nearly one fifth of those with eczema (18.2%, 4669 of 25 672) had more than 1 eczema diagnosis. Seborrheic dermatitis (SD) and atopic dermatitis (AD) were the most common forms, with SD affecting 4.3% of adults and AD 2.5%. Among those with multiple diagnoses, the most frequent combinations were AD and SD (25.9%), allergic contact dermatitis (ACD) and SD (15.3%), and AD and ACD (13.8%). SD was also the most common first diagnosis, occurring in 33.1% of cases.

Authors' comments

"Real-world evidence of treatment effectiveness, especially when multiple skin conditions coexist, should be prioritized. Understanding these patterns can guide more effective, personalized treatment strategies for patients with eczema."

Click here for more details.