Postmortem examinations using magnetic resonance imaging: four year review of a working service

An impressive downward trend in cases of occupational skin diseases in hairdressers has occurred in Northern Bavaria over the past decade.This seems to reflect improvements in working conditions due to new legislation and intensified preventive measures rather than a change in the natural history of occupational skin disease.5 Because of the size of the region studied and the sampling scheme, the findings can be generalised and applied to Germany as a whole. 2 3 Although the prognosis for recovery from occupational skin disease has not changed significantly over the past five decades, 5 cooperation between dermatolo-gists, government physicians, employers, employees, the competent workers' compensation board, the hairdressers' guild, hair cosmetics manufacturers, and legislative authorities has led to a reduction in occupational skin diseases in hairdressing.However, to achieve a longlasting reduction, interdisciplinary cooperation must be continued and primary prevention should start as early as possible, preferably by legally binding supplementary medical pre-employment examination.2 The Principle G24 "Skin diseases (other than skin cancer)" is under discussion in Germany.