Diagnostic Essentials for Erythema Multiforme in Chinese medicine:
(1) It occurs suddenly, with the premonitory symptom of general discomfort before eruption, often accompanied by angina, tonsillitis, arthritis, etc.

(2) It happens frequently on the border of the finger, palm, forearm, dorsum of the foot, leg, face and neck symmetrically and involves the oral membrane and genitalia in severe conditions.

(3) Skin rash is multiform, manifested by plaque, papule, urticaria, blister, bleb, erosion or hen~orrhagic injury. Several kinds of skin rashes often exist simultaneously in symmetric distribution. The typical skin rash is often edematous papule or annular plaque with dark red or purple red color in the center, accompanied by blisters and protruded red ring on the border. If most annular erythemas are overlapped, specific iridic injury can be caused among various colors.

(4) Mucous injury takes place. After rupture, erosion, spontaneous burning sensation and pruritus often ensues. There can be general symptoms of fever, headache,and joint pain. Usually after 2 - 4 weeks, it is cured automatically but often recurs.

(5) In winter, it happens on the dorsum of the hand and foot. The skin lesion is termed cold multiform erythema.

(6) Severe condition is exactly Stevens-Johnson's syndrome, characterized by sudden onset, with serious general symptoms of high fever and headache, extensiveskin lesions, obvious bleb, and serious mucous injury in the eye, oral cavity and external genitalia, accompanied by involvement of the lung, kidney, liver, heart and blood vessels.

In TCM, a disease or a symptom might be caused by one pathogenic factor, even two or three pathogenic factors. When diagnosing a disease or a symptom, TCM doctors must follow the principle of "Syndrome Dfferentiation", and then "Suit the Remedy to the Case". In order to gain a more definite and valuable diagnosis, it's important and necessary for the doctor to learn the detailed health information of the patient, including his/her disease duration, age, sex, height, weight, family history, urine, stool, diet, sleep, sweat, energy, mood (emotion), as well as the tongue conditions and the palm conditions, etc. If you would want our expert to create a TCM diagnosis, you're welcome to contact us.