Life Insurance With Dermatitis
Dermatitis and eczema are often used interchangeably, and both describe inflamed, itchy, sometimes cracked skin rather than one specific disease.
What is worth separating out is the cause, because dermatitis is one of the conditions most likely to have been caused by work. Hairdressers, cleaners, caterers, nurses and nail technicians all feature, and if that is your situation then your skin and your occupation are the same story.
This page covers what we would need. The decision on terms is the insurer's.
The short answer
Dermatitis is inflamed skin, and the useful detail is what brought it on. Contact dermatitis from something you handle at work is a different entry from seborrhoeic dermatitis on the scalp, and occupational dermatitis in particular connects your skin to your job, which matters if you are also looking at income protection.
What it is
Contact dermatitis is a reaction to something touching the skin, either an irritant such as detergent, solvent or wet work, or an allergen the immune system has become sensitised to. It commonly affects the hands.
Seborrhoeic dermatitis affects areas with more oil glands, typically the scalp, face and chest, and is associated with a yeast that lives normally on skin. Dandruff is its mildest form.
Atopic dermatitis, usually called eczema, tends to start in childhood and often sits alongside asthma and hay fever. Management across all of them generally means emollients, topical steroids, avoiding triggers, and sometimes stronger treatment under a specialist.
Why it comes up on an application
- The cause is the differentiator. Something triggered by a substance you can avoid is a different picture from something that has been present since childhood.
- Occupational dermatitis connects two parts of an application. Sensitisation to something you handle daily can make the work unsustainable, which is an income protection question as much as a skin question, and it is worth being clear whether your skin has ever affected your ability to work.
- Atopic dermatitis frequently travels with asthma and hay fever, so the respiratory questions on an application are genuinely relevant if that is your version.
- Severe cases are sometimes treated with medication that affects the immune system, and anything immune-affecting is worth stating plainly rather than summarising as cream.
What we would ask you
- Which type you have, where on your body it affects, and when it started
- Whether it is linked to anything you handle at work or at home
- Whether it has ever stopped you working or made you change what you do
- Whether you also have asthma or hay fever
- What you use to manage it, including anything taken by mouth or by injection
- Have you ever had cancer, a heart condition (including heart attack), stroke or brain injury, MS or a neurological condition, or Type 1 or 2 diabetes?
- Do you have any other medical conditions? (please state condition and any treatment taken)
- Are you waiting any medical tests, appointments or treatment?
- Date of birth (DD/MM/YYYY)
- Do you smoke?
If It Came From Your Work, That Is The Important Part
Occupational dermatitis is common enough to be a recognised problem in several trades, and it is the version with real consequences.
The mechanism is sensitisation. Repeated contact with something at work damages the skin barrier, the immune system learns to react, and after that even small exposures provoke it. Once that has happened the standard advice is to avoid the substance, which for somebody whose trade is built around it means a problem bigger than their skin.
That is why income protection is listed first on this page. If you work in a trade where this is a known risk, the question is not only what your skin means for a life insurance application, it is what happens to your earnings if you can no longer do the work.
Say What You Use, Including The Strong Things
Most people with dermatitis describe their treatment as creams, and for most people that is accurate.
Where it is not accurate is at the more persistent end, where treatment can include oral medication, light therapy or injected treatments that work on the immune system. Those are a materially different entry in a medical history from an emollient, and summarising them as cream is the kind of answer that causes trouble later.
The same applies to specialist involvement. If a dermatologist has been involved, say so. An application asking whether you have seen a specialist is asking exactly that, and the answer is simple to give.
Which cover is relevant
Listed first here on purpose. Dermatitis is one of the few skin conditions that genuinely ends careers, through sensitisation to something a trade cannot avoid, and this is the cover that responds to being unable to work.
The usual starting point. What is available depends on your whole health picture rather than on a skin entry alone.
Pays on diagnosis of a listed serious condition, and dermatitis is not one. It is worth having for the risks it does cover rather than for your skin.
Common questions
Does dermatitis affect life insurance?+
What any insurer decides is their call and rests on your whole health picture, so we will not predict it. The information worth preparing is which type you have, what causes it, what you use for it, and whether it has ever affected your work.
My dermatitis is from my job. Does that change things?+
It makes income protection the more pressing conversation. Sensitisation to something you handle daily can make a trade unsustainable, which is an earnings problem rather than a cosmetic one, and that is what income protection responds to.
Is eczema the same thing?+
The words are used interchangeably, and atopic eczema is one type of dermatitis. It is worth saying which version you have, because childhood atopic eczema that travels with asthma and hay fever is a different entry from contact dermatitis that started at work last year.
I only use creams. Do I still declare it?+
Answer the questions you are asked. If you are asked about skin conditions or ongoing conditions and it applies, then yes, and using only topical treatment is a useful answer in itself rather than a reason to leave it out.
Can I get cover if I have dermatitis?+
We cannot promise any application will be accepted, because acceptance, price and any exclusions are always the insurer's decision. What we can do is put your details to the insurers we work with and tell you what is actually available to you.
Cover that often goes with this
The gaps we most often find sitting next to this one.