Acrodynia
Description of Acrodynia:
Acrodynia (also known as "Calomel disease," "Erythredemic polyneuropathy,"
and "Pink disease") is a type of mercury poisoning in children characterized by
pain and pink discoloration of the hands and feet. The word is derived from the
Greek, where ακρος means high (as in: upper extremity) and οδυνη means pain. As
such, it might be (erroneously) used to indicate that a patient has pain in the
hands or feet. However, acrodynia is a disease rather than a symptom. Also known
as pink disease, erythredema, Selter's disease, or Swift-Feer disease, acrodynia
was relatively commonplace amongst children in the first half of the 20th
century. Initially, the cause of the acrodynia epidemic among infants and young
children was unknown; however, mercury poisoning, primarily from calomel in
teething powders, began to be widely accepted as its cause in the 1950s and 60s.
The prevalence of acrodynia decreased greatly after calomel was excluded from
most teething powders in 1954.
Specific Acrodynia Information
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