Vitiligo is the most common depigmenting skin disease.

Patients with vitiligo have milky white spots on their skin. The pigment is missing in these places. Vitiligo patients may benefit from treatment with corticosteroid ointment or UVB light therapy.

The total estimated number of people with vitiligo in the Netherlands is approximately 150,000. The experts at the Amsterdam UMC/SNIP consider approximately 72,000 diagnosed patients to be a realistic estimate: 34,000 patients have Non Segmental Vitiligo and vitiligo in the face.

In patients with this condition, the skin loses pigment. The pigment cells break down and no longer produce melanin (the substance that determines skin color). This causes milky white spots on their skin or even white strands in their hair. Vitiligo varies in size and shape. The border of the spots on the skin may be clearly visible because there is a dark border around it that separates the vitiligo spot from the pigmented skin. This is not the case with all patients.
Vitiligo is not contagious.

The spots can in principle be on the entire body. Usually the spots are symmetrical (vitiligo vulgaris).
In other cases, the spots appear exclusively on certain areas of the body (vitiligo segmentalis).

The most common places where stains appear are:

• face (around mouth, nose, eyes)
• hands and feet
• armpits
• around genitals and anus
• on pressure points, such as elbows and knees

If vitiligo occurs on the hairy skin, the hair may also turn white. The course of vitiligo is variable and therefore cannot be predicted. In most patients, vitiligo spreads, possibly alternating with periods in which the spots partially disappear. The latter is possible through exposure to the sun.
This rarely happens on the face, hands, genitals and hair. There are triggering factors.