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Vitiligo Diagnosis

Vitiligo detection is not very complicated, but the challenging part of diagnosis is to understand and analyse the risk factors and ruling out other associated serious disease. Prior to finalising the therapeutic course of an individual, age of onset of the disease, family history, precipitating events, work-related exposure, level of the disease and area association say whether hair is affected, earlier prescribed treatments and their effects have to be assessed.

First and foremost is the physical examination by the skin specialist which involves examination of white patches of skin, especially on the body parts exposed to sun, such as the hands, feet, arms, face, and lips. The white/lighter colour patches of Vitiligo are more easily seen in the dark skinned individuals, but are difficult to diagnose in white race. At times, the specialist may make the use of a Wood's lamp. The depigmented areas of skin shine intense white with this handheld ultraviolet light.

In suspected cases of Vitiligo, the specialist would enquire regarding your pasthistory of Vitiligo and its treatment. Significant factors in the analysis consist of a family history of Vitiligo; a rash, suntan, or other skin trauma that happened at the site of Vitiligo 2 to 3 months prior to the development of depigmentation, premature greying of the hair (before age 35), stress or ill health. In addition, the familial incidence of any autoimmune diseases and the person’s sensitivity to the sun would be enquired.

It is important to understand if the patient has other autoimmune diseases. For that, the doctor may ask you to take a blood test to check for the presence of antinuclear antibodies (a type of autoantibody).

Thyroid peroxidase antibody (TPOAb) -Thyroid antibody testing is primarily ordered to help diagnose an autoimmune thyroid disease and to separate it from other forms of thyroiditis.