Hematidrosis
| Hematidrosis | |
|---|---|
| Synonym | blood sweat, haematidrosis, hematohidrosis, hemidrosis |
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| Red tinted sweat (or 'blood sweat') caused by hematohidrosis. | |
| Classification and external resources | |
| ICD-10 | Xxx.x |
| ICD-9-CM | xxx |
Hematidrosis, also called blood sweat, is a very rare condition in which a human sweats blood. The term is from Greek haima/haimatos αἷμα, αἵματος meaning blood and hidrōs ἱδρώς meaning sweat.
Blood usually oozes from the forehead, nails, umbilicus, and other skin surfaces. In addition, oozing from mucocutaneous surfaces causing nosebleeds, blood stained tears, and vicarious menstruation are common. The episodes may be proceeded by intense headache and abdominal pain and are usually self-limiting. In some conditions, the secreted fluid is more dilute and appears to be blood-tinged, while others may have darker bright red secretions resembling blood.
While the extent of blood loss generally is minimal, hematidrosis also results in the skin becoming extremely tender and fragile.
Hematohidrosis is a condition in which capillary blood vessels that feed the sweat glands rupture, causing them to exude blood, occurring under conditions of extreme physical or emotional stress. Severe mental anxiety activates the sympathetic nervous system to invoke the stress-fight or flight reaction to such a degree as to cause hemorrhage of the vessels supplying the sweat glands into the ducts of the sweat glands. It has been suggested that acute fear and extreme stress can cause haematidrosis.
Investigation such as platelets count, platelet aggregation test, coagulation profile and skin biopsy reveal no abnormalities and direct light microscopy of fluid demonstrates presence of normal red blood cells. Investigations also failed to show any vasculitis or skin appendages (i.e. sweat glands, sebaceous glands and hair follicles) abnormalities.
A 2015 case study investigated hematidrosis with a patient who has epilepsy.
Effect on the body is weakness and mild to moderate dehydration from the severe anxiety and both blood and sweat loss.
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