eczema
- 1A non-contagious inflammation of the skin, acute or chronic, marked by redness, itching, and outbreaks of oozing blisters that crust over and turn scaly.
Every winter her eczema flared up, and the itchy patches on her wrists began to weep and crust over.
The school nurse reassured worried parents that eczema isn't contagious, and the boy with red, scaly arms returned to class the next day.
Note
Behind the name is a Greek picture of the rash: ékzema, "an eruption of the skin", built on ekzéō, "to boil out, break out", and taken into English through Latin as a learned word. It suits blisters that rise, weep and crust over. The plural is eczemas, or eczemata on the Greek pattern of its -ma ending. The same word also covers any dermatitis and, more narrowly, the atopic kind.
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Origin
A learned borrowing from Latin eczema, itself from Ancient Greek ékzema ('cutaneous eruption'), which comes from ekzéō ('to boil out, break out') plus a noun-forming suffix.