Moist Desquamation

Moist desquamation is a description of the clinical pattern seen as a consequence of radiation exposure where the skin thins and then begins to weep because of loss of integrity of the epithelial barrier and decreased oncotic pressure. Typically this occurs at doses of 15 - 20 Gray, far higher than any diagnostic scan and more typical of levels seen in radiotherapy or deployment of nuclear armament. Historically, this was a common phenomenon in Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II with the atomic bomb attacks from the United States.

The phenomenon was famously described by John Hersey in his novel Hiroshima.