How do you examine bromhidrosis?

Bromhidrosis or body odour is a fairly common condition presenting to a dermatologist. But how do you examine your patient to confirm your diagnosis of bromhidrosis?

verschiedene Deodorants (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A MRC sponsored study conducted in the university of Bristol, suggests that you should look into their ears! A particular SNP (Single Neucleotide Polymorphism) in the ABCC11 gene gives rise to both wet ear wax and odourous sweat. Apparently there is no other known genetic association for odourous sweat.

There is no mention of whether it involves apocrine or eccrine sweat glands or both. Besides this is an incidental finding on a cohort for a different purpose. The article also makes a bizarre claim that at least 80% of deodorant use is probably unnecessary. Well, do you use deodorant, because you have body odour?