OBJECTIVE: To characterize the atypical cutaneous presentations in the coxsackievirus A6 (CVA6)–associated North American enterovirus outbreak of 2011–2012. METHODS: We performed a retrospective case series of pediatric patients who presented with atypical cases of hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) from July 2011 to June 2012 at 7 academic pediatric dermatology centers. Patients were included if they tested positive for CVA6 or if they met clinical criteria for atypical HFMD (an enanthem or exanthem characteristic of HFMD with unusual morphology or extent of cutaneous findings). We collected demographic, epidemiologic, and clinical data including history of skin conditions, morphology and extent of exanthem, systemic symptoms, and diagnostic test results. RESULTS: Eighty patients were included in this study (median age 1.5 years, range 4 months–16 years). Seventeen patients were CVA6-positive, and 63 met clinical inclusion criteria. Ninety-nine percent of patients exhibited a vesiculobullous and erosive eruption; 61% of patients had rash involving >10% body surface area. The exanthem had a perioral, extremity, and truncal distribution in addition to involving classic HFMD areas such as palms, soles, and buttocks. In 55% of patients, the eruption was accentuated in areas of eczematous dermatitis, termed “eczema coxsackium.” Other morphologies included Gianotti-Crosti–like (37%), petechial/purpuric (17%) eruptions, and delayed onychomadesis and palm and sole desquamation. There were no patients with serious systemic complications. CONCLUSIONS: The CVA6-associated enterovirus outbreak was responsible for an exanthem potentially more widespread, severe, and varied than classic HFMD that could be confused with bullous impetigo, eczema herpeticum, vasculitis, and primary immunobullous disease.

Annular pustular psoriasis (APP) is a rare form of pustular psoriasis with a chronic recurrent course and good prognosis. We report three cases of APP in children, two of whom were siblings. Review of the medical literature reveals that a disproportionately high percentage of cases of APP occur in children. In some cases topical therapy can clear the condition, although in severe or recalcitrant disease, systemic therapy may be necessary.

Congenital midline cervical cleft is a rare anomaly of the ventral neck that heretofore has not been reported in the dermatology literature. We present a case of a midline cervical cleft that was diagnosed and managed at an early age. We also review the literature and discuss its clinical and histologic features, treatment, and possible embryology.

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ABSTRACT. A 1-year-old girl presented with acute onset of edematous erythematous plaques associated with bullae on her extremities and accompanied by peripheral eosinophilia. She was afebrile, and the skin lesions were pruritic but not tender. The patient was treated with intravenously administered antibiotics for presumed cellulitis, without improvement. However, the lesions responded rapidly to systemic steroid therapy. On the basis of lesional morphologic features, peripheral eosinophilia, and cutaneous histopathologic features, a diagnosis of Wells' syndrome was made. Wells' syndrome is extremely rare in childhood, with 27 pediatric cases reported in the literature. Because it is seen so infrequently, there are no specific guidelines for evaluation and management of Wells' syndrome among children. W ells' syndrome, or eosinophilic cellulitis, is a rare, recurrent, inflammatory dermatosis of unknown pathogenesis. In 1971, Wells 1 described 4 patients with an acute pruritic dermatitis clinically resembling bacterial cellulitis but with histopathologic findings characterized by dermal eosinophilia, phagocytic histiocytes, and the presence of flame figures. He initially called this syndrome recurrent granulomatous dermatitis with eosinophilia but later simplified the name to eosinophilic cellulitis. 2 Wells' syndrome is seen more commonly among adults but has been observed among children. Some hypothesize that this syndrome may represent a hypersensitivity response to a circulating antigen. 2 Associated precipitants include insect bites, medication reactions, recent immunization, myeloproliferative disorders, malignancies, and infections. We describe a case of a young child with no identifiable triggering factors, and we review the evidence for evaluation and management of these pediatric cases. CASE REPORTA previously healthy, 1-year-old girl presented with acute onset of edematous erythematous plaques, with associated bullae, on her lower extremities and left arm (Fig 1). These lesions were pruritic but not painful, and the patient was afebrile. Her parents denied a history of insect bites, ingestion of medications, trauma, or other intercurrent illness. The patient's most recent immunizations had been received 3 months earlier. The patient did not have a history of asthma, and there was no family history of asthma or atopic disease.The patient was admitted with presumed bacterial cellulitis and was treated with intravenously administered oxacillin, without improvement. Her laboratory studies were significant for an elevated white blood cell count of 30 ϫ 10 9 cells per L, with peripheral eosinophilia of 48%. After the patient failed to respond to systemically administered antibiotics, examination of vesicle fluid was performed and revealed numerous eosinophils. Subsequently, the diagnosis of probable Wells' syndrome was made. Oral steroid therapy was started at 2 mg/kg, and the patient's cutaneous symptoms improved within 24 hours, leaving residual erythema and hyperpigmentation (Fig 2). Five days after the i...