FIGURE 7.

Assessment of inflammation in a patient with hidradenitis suppurativa. Infrared thermography was used to assess the severity and area of inflammation in a patient with hidradenitis suppurativa. Assessment of the area of inflammation on regular clinical photographs (left) is challenging in patients with darker skin tones, which leads to subjective patient severity scoring. In contrast, because infrared thermography images (right) are impervious to skin color, hotspots (asterisk) can easily be used to map the extent of inflammatory changes. Previous research has demonstrated that the area of inflammation and its temperature gradient highly correlate with current clinical scores, offering a powerful insight into the underlying condition. Furthermore, thermography is able to identify open wounds (arrows) and tunneling in the dermis (arrowheads) that may not be evident to clinical inspection alone. Images, courtesy of Dr. Sheila C. Wang and JR-G, were acquired using the Skin and Wound mobile app (Swift Medical Inc., Toronto, ON, Canada) paired to a FLIR One Pro mobile camera.