Photo Assessment of Eczema Study –
Further information
Things to know before joining the study.
Video explaining the study.
This study will help to determine if it is possible to use photos to assess eczema severity in future eczema clinical studies.
- Who can take part?
You can take part if you:
- Have eczema
- Live in the UK
- Are at least 1 year old
- Have access to a device that can take and upload photos
You can’t take part if:
- Your eczema is only in places where your skin is in contact with nickel e.g. jewellery
- Your eczema is only around varicose veins
- Your eczema in only on the hands
If you are less than 16 years old, your parent/carer will need to agree to you taking part.
Video explaining how to take and upload photos.
2. What will I have to do if I take part?
After joining the study and completing an online consent form, we’ll ask you some questions about you and your eczema, and give you a unique link to a secure web portal, hosted by Imperial College London.
You will be given information on how to take and safely upload your photos.
You might need someone to help you take photos of the eczema if it’s somewhere that you can’t see. But don’t worry, you won’t be asked to take photos of private or sensitive areas of the body. Some photos may contain features that may identify you e.g. your face, scarring, birthmarks, body art, piercing etc. You can decide whether you are happy to upload these images or not.
The study will last for 4 weeks. Every week we’ll send the secure link via email or text. We’ll ask you to upload photos and answer a short questionnaire about your eczema and how you found uploading the photos.
We may also ask if you’re willing to talk to a researcher from the University of Nottingham about your experience of being in the study. It’s entirely up to you if you do this or not. You can say on the study consent form if you are happy to be contacted about taking part in a telephone/online interview. This does not commit you to taking part in an interview. We may send you further information about the interview to see if you are interested. We will ask you to sign a separate consent form before taking part in the interview.
- What are the benefits of taking part?
We hope that you will find taking part in this study interesting. It is a chance to help improve how we measure eczema in future research studies.
- What are the risks of taking part?
We always put your safety first. We don’t think that taking part in this study will cause you any harm. You can continue using your usual eczema treatments as you normally would. You may need to store photos of your eczema on your mobile device before you can upload them to the secure web portal, so it will be up to you to delete them after uploading your photos if you do not want to store them there.
- What will happen if I don’t want to carry on with this study?
You can change your mind at any time without giving a reason. If you decide you don’t want to carry on, we’ll still keep and use the research data you provided before you stopped taking part.
- What will happen to my photos?
We’ll put your photos into a computer program that will score how your eczema is at the moment. This computer programme has been developed using ‘machine learning’. It has been trained to assess the severity of eczema using photos from hundreds of people with eczema, including people of all skin tones. This programme assesses the common features of eczema, so that it can estimate how severe the eczema is from photos. The computer will provide a score for each photo that you upload. These scores will be shared securely between Imperial College London and the University of Nottingham.
Your photos may also be viewed and scored by a member of the research team who is trained to assess eczema. The assessor scores will be compared with the scores from the computer program.
Your photos will be assigned a code number, this means that nobody can identify you personally from the photos assuming there are no identifiable features present in the photo. We’ll keep all information about you safe and secure. The photos will also be shared with the research team at the University of Nottingham and the sponsor of the study (Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust).
Your photos will be stored on a secure platform at Imperial College London and securely at the University of Nottingham for the duration of the trial and by the study sponsor (Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust) for at least 5 years after the end of the project.
We may share some of the data or photos that you provide with other researchers. Whilst we will do our best to ensure you cannot be identified from this data, we cannot guarantee this if the photos contain features that may identify you e.g. your face, scarring, birthmarks, body art, piercing etc. You can decide whether you are happy to upload these images or not. We will not use images in public without your permission.
- Can I know the results from my photo assessments?
We won’t be able to share the results from the photos you send us. The computer system we’re using is still new and being tested, so we’re not sure how well it can score your eczema just yet.
- What will happen at the end of the study?
Once the study has finished, we will send you a copy of the results and will share the results widely. These reports won’t reveal anything about individual participants or share any of the photos without permission.
If you upload at least one set of photos, you’ll have the choice to enter a prize draw to win either a £25 shopping voucher or a child-friendly book about eczema as a thank you for taking part.
- How to contact us?
- Who has approved this study?
This study has been reviewed and given favourable opinion by London-Surrey Research Ethics Committee (23/PR/0899).
- Who is organising and funding this study?
The study is organised by Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (the Sponsor) and is coordinated by the University of Nottingham. The study is funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) under its Programme Grants for Applied Research programme (PGfAR NIHR203279).
If you would like to find out more about how your data will be used, please click on the button below.
This page was last updated: 22/01/2025