About Allergies: Four Common Causes of a Face Rash After Hair Dye

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Allergies Allergies Symptoms / Diagnosis Treatment Coping From Daniel More, MD, your Guide to Allergies I have seen countless patients over the years that experience a facial rash within a few days after coloring their hair. There are a number of different reasons for this – the most common of which is the hair dye itself. Despite this fact, nearly every patient that I encounter seems to be surprised that coloring their hair would result in a facial rash – especially because they have used the same hair coloring for years (sometimes even decade) without any problems.    4 Reasons You Have a Facial Rash After Coloring Your Hair The reason that a rash first occurs on the face after coloring the hair is because the skin on the face is much thinner – and far more reactive – than the skin on the scalp. In fact, the scalp skin is so thick, that reactions to hair dye only rarely cause rashes on the scalp. In addition, a person may have used a particular hair dye for many years without problems – until the immune system becomes sensitized to the chemical through an unnoticed cut, scrape or other disruption on the skin – after which the immune system reacts to the chemical present on the hair and skin. Search Related Topics:  contact dermatitis  hair dye allergy  cosmetic allergy Evaluation of Contact Dermatitis Contact dermatitis is an itchy, blistering skin rash typically caused by the direct contact of a substance with the skin. There are 2 types of contact dermatitis: irritant and allergic. This difference is often difficult to tell apart, and is not usually an important distinction to make.  Contact dermatitis results in 5.7 million doctor visits each year in the United States, and all ages are affected. Females are slightly more commonly affected than males, and teenagers and middle-aged adults seems to be the most common age groups affected. Search Related Topics:  itching  skin allergies  eczema Patch Testing for Contact Dermatitis Patch testing is used to identify causes of contact dermatitis . Contact dermatitis is an immunologic reaction to a particular substance; poison-oak (and poison-ivy and poison-sumac) is an example of such a reaction. Contact dermatitis is not a true allergy ; therefore patch testing is performed in a very different way than allergy skin testing. There are no allergic antibodies involved in contact dermatitis; rather, various white blood cells entering into the skin cause the reaction. Search Related Topics:  allergies  allergist  allergy testing Related Searches Hair Dye Allergy Food Allergy Rash Allergies Allergy or Allergies Allergies & Asthma Featured Articles Anaphylaxis Allergy Shots and Drops (Immunotherapy) Alternative Therapies in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Allergies Glossary of Terms Information on the Most Common Allergy Medications Blog   More from About.com Sign up for the About.com Money Newsletter! Managing your finances can be confusing. We're here to help! Sign up to receive budgeting, saving and investing tips, delivered straight to your inbox. Sign-up for Shareables! An every-morning rundown of the day in history, headlines and trends produced by your pals at About.com. Please sign up it's free (of course), we think you will like it! This newsletter is written by: Daniel More, MD Allergies Guide Email Me | My Blog | My Forum   Sign up for more free newsletters on your favorite topics You are receiving this newsletter because you subscribed to the About.com Allergies newsletter. If you wish to change your email address or unsubscribe, please click here. If you would like to unsubscribe from all newsletters sent from About.com, please send an email to optout@about.com with "Unsubscribe" as the subject line. About.com respects your privacy: Our Privacy Policy Contact Information: 1500 Broadway, 6th Floor New York, NY, 10036 © 2014 About.com   Must Reads What are Allergies? Symptoms of Allergies Diagnosis of Allergies Treatment of Allergies Preventing Allergies Advertisement