Tinea incognito

Tinea corporis, a common fungal infection of the skin, better known as ringworm, whose appearance has been modified by the application of high-potency topical steroids in a way that renders it no longer visually diagnostic.

Tinea incognito usually presents as nonspecific inflammatory papules and pustules without the characteristic features of tinea.

In some cases, however, tinea incognito may retain the scaly appearance of tinea but be modified by local steroids so that it becomes extensive and bizarrely shaped.

The condition was first described and so named in 1968 by FA Ive and R Marks (in the British Medical Journal vol.

3, pages 149-52).

It is, literally, tinea in disguise, tinea veiled by treatment.