Intended for healthcare professionals

  1. Student
  2. Picture Quiz: Know...
  3. Picture Quiz: Know your enemy
Student Education

Picture Quiz: Know your enemy

BMJ 2003; 326 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/sbmj.0306189 (Published 01 June 2003) Cite this as: BMJ 2003;326:0306189
  1. Stephen Goldie, fourth year medical student and champion fisherman1,
  2. Vincent Smith, junior research fellow in entomology2
  1. 1University of Glasgow
  2. 2Wellcome Trust, Division of Environmental and Evolutionary Biology, University of Glasgow

Case history

A 22 year old man visits his general practitioner for advice on an “itchy rash” which has developed overnight. The young man had just returned from a fishing trip on a loch near the village of Fort Augustus in the Highlands of Scotland, famed for its position at the bottom end of Loch Ness. He and a friend had camped on the shore of the fishing loch. On closer examination the doctor noted an urticarial rash spread all over the man's face, neck, hands, and forearms (figures 1 and 2)--that is, the exposed areas of the body that were not covered by clothing while fishing.

Fig 1
Fig 2

Questions

  1. What is the cause of the rash?

  2. What advice should the doctor give on current management of symptoms?

  3. Are there any suggestions the doctor can give on prevention for the future?

Answers

  1. The rash has been caused primarily by midge bites …

View Full Text

Log in

Log in through your institution

Subscribe

* For online subscription

Buy this article

Back to top