Hidradenitis suppurativa is a long-term skin condition that causes painful lumps, boils, and tunnels under the skin, often in the armpits, groin, buttocks, or under the breasts. The early symptoms of hidradenitis suppurativa can look like repeated pimples or tender bumps that flare and return over months or years. It most often starts after puberty and is more common in young adults, especially women, but anyone can develop it. Not everyone will have the same experience. Hidradenitis suppurativa is usually not life-threatening, and treatment often includes skin care, pain relief, antibiotics, anti-inflammatory medicines, and sometimes surgery to remove damaged tissue.
How many people live with Hidradenitis?
Worldwide, estimates suggest roughly 20 to 55 million people are living with hidradenitis suppurativa, depending on whether studies count self-reported symptoms or only cases diagnosed by a doctor (Gill et al., 2019). In the United States, a large insurance-claims study estimated about 330,000 people had a diagnosis of hidradenitis suppurativa (Garg et al., 2017).
Overview
HidradenitisSymptoms
Hidradenitis suppurativa often causes painful, deep lumps under the skin, usually in the armpits, groin, buttocks, or under the breasts. These spots can drain pus, smell unpleasant, and leave scars. Early symptoms of hidradenitis suppurativa may look like recurring boils.
Outlook and prognosis
For many living with hidradenitis, the outlook is long-term but manageable: symptoms often come and go, and early treatment can reduce painful flare-ups, scarring, and tunnels under the skin. Severity varies, and some people improve over time.
Causes and risk factors
Hidradenitis suppurativa likely develops from blocked hair follicles, immune system overactivity, hormones, and inherited risk. Smoking, obesity, friction, sweating, and a family history can raise the chance of hidradenitis suppurativa or make it more severe.
Genetic influences
Genetics matter in hidradenitis, and inherited differences in immune and skin-related genes can raise risk. Still, hidradenitis is not caused by genes alone, and hormones, smoking, weight, and other factors also play a role.
Diagnosis
Hidradenitis is diagnosed mainly from your symptoms, skin changes, and where boils or tunnels keep coming back. A clinician examines the areas and asks about flares. Tests may rule out infection or similar conditions.
Treatment and drugs
Hidradenitis is treated with a mix of daily skin care, pain relief, and medicines that calm inflammation, including antibiotics or biologic drugs. Some people also need steroid injections, drainage, or surgery for stubborn tunnels and scars.
Symptoms
Living with Hidradenitis often means painful, recurring bumps in places where skin rubs together, such as the armpits, groin, buttocks, or under the breasts. You might notice small changes at first, such as tender lumps, blackheads, or spots that keep returning in the same area. The early symptoms of Hidradenitis can be easy to mistake for ingrown hairs, acne, or boils. Over time, some bumps may swell, break open, drain, and heal with scars, while others stay deep and sore under the skin.
Hidradenitis often starts with tender, deep bumps that can feel warm, swollen, and very sore. They may look like boils or acne cysts, but they tend to come back in the same places.
These bumps usually appear where skin rubs and sweat collects, such as the armpits, groin, inner thighs, buttocks, or under the breasts. Some people also get them on the lower belly or around the genitals.
Before a lump appears, the skin may itch, burn, sting, or feel unusually tender. This can happen hours to days before a flare becomes easy to see.
Some areas develop clusters of blackheads or small pitted spots, often in pairs. These can sit near painful lumps and may be one of the earlier visible skin changes.
How people usually first notice Hidradenitis?
Many people first notice hidradenitis as what seems like a tender pimple, boil, or ingrown hair in places where skin rubs together, such as the armpits, groin, buttocks, or under the breasts. What makes the first signs of hidradenitis different is that these painful lumps often keep coming back in the same areas, may grow deeper under the skin, and can sometimes drain fluid or have an odor instead of healing like an ordinary breakout. For many living with hidradenitis, that pattern of repeated, painful flare-ups is the clue that something more than acne or a simple skin infection may be going on.
Types of Hidradenitis
When people ask about the types of hidradenitis, doctors usually mean stages of hidradenitis suppurativa rather than completely different diseases. These stages describe how extensive the skin changes are and whether tunnels and scarring have formed over time. Symptoms don’t always look the same for everyone. Many living with hidradenitis suppurativa stay in one stage for a long time, while others notice it becomes more severe.
Stage I
This is the mildest form, with one or more painful lumps or boil-like bumps that tend to come and go. The areas are separate, and there are no lasting tunnels under the skin or widespread scarring.
Stage II
People with hidradenitis suppurativa at this stage usually have repeated flare-ups in the same areas, and some scars begin to build up. Narrow tunnels can form under the skin, but the affected spots are still separated rather than joining into one large area.
Stage III
This is the most severe stage, with larger connected areas of inflammation, multiple tunnels under the skin, and heavier scarring. For many, this can mean ongoing drainage, pain with walking or sitting, and skin changes that interfere with daily life.
Can I slow down the onset of symptoms?
No, there is no proven way to reliably delay hidradenitis from starting, but research suggests that not smoking and keeping weight in a healthy range may lower risk and are linked to milder disease in some people. Once it begins, gentle skin care, avoiding repeated rubbing in skin folds, and managing other health problems that raise body-wide inflammation may help reduce flare-ups, but this is not the same as preventing the condition. There are no well-established medicines to prevent hidradenitis before symptoms appear, but getting diagnosed and treated early can help limit worsening and scarring, so small steps still matter even though they cannot promise a certain outcome.
What genetics can tell you about symptoms
Genetics can help explain why hidradenitis suppurativa tends to run in some families and why symptoms can look different from one person to another. In a small number of people, inherited gene changes are linked to earlier onset or more severe disease, but for most, genetics does not clearly predict exactly where flare-ups will happen, how painful they will be, or how the condition will change over time. In everyday life, this means your genes may raise your risk, but they are only one part of the picture alongside hormones, smoking, body weight, skin friction, and other factors.
Causes and risk factors
Painful lumps that keep coming back under the arms, breasts, buttocks, or groin can be part of hidradenitis, and they often begin when hair follicles become blocked and inflamed. Hidradenitis can run in families, so some people inherit a higher risk. It is more common after puberty and in women, and hormone shifts may play a part. Smoking, extra body weight, heat, sweating, and skin friction are common risk factors and can help explain what causes hidradenitis flare-ups. It’s rarely just one factor—it’s the mix that matters.
What are the most common causes or risk factors?
Hidradenitis seems to happen when hair follicles in areas where skin rubs together, such as the armpits or groin, become blocked and inflamed, and many people living with it have a family history, which suggests an inherited tendency. The strongest risk factors are smoking, excess body weight, and hormone changes, which is why it often starts after puberty and is more common in women. It is not caused by poor hygiene, and it is not something you can catch from someone else.
Environmental and biological risk factors
Painful bumps in the armpits, groin, or under the breasts often begin after puberty rather than in early childhood. Knowing the main risk factors for hidradenitis, also called hidradenitis suppurativa, can help explain why it develops in some people. Doctors often group risks into internal (biological) and external (environmental).
Hidradenitis is diagnosed more often in people assigned female at birth than in males. Researchers think differences in hormones and hair follicle biology help explain some of this higher risk.
Hidradenitis rarely starts before puberty and most often begins in the teens, 20s, or 30s. This timing points to hormone changes and mature hair follicles as important biological factors.
Puberty and other hormone changes can make hidradenitis more likely to appear in someone who is already vulnerable. Some people first notice symptoms around menstrual cycles or other times when hormone levels shift.
Repeated rubbing or pressure in skin folds can irritate the hair follicles where hidradenitis usually starts. Tight waistbands, bra bands, or ongoing chafing may raise risk in the armpits, groin, buttocks, or under the breasts.
Genetic risk factors
Questions about heredity are common when hidradenitis affects several people in one family. In most cases, there is not one single gene behind it; several inherited differences likely work together to raise risk. Carrying a genetic change doesn’t guarantee the condition will appear. When hidradenitis starts young or shows up in multiple close relatives, doctors may suspect a stronger genetic contribution.
Family history: Having a parent, sibling, or several relatives with hidradenitis raises the chance of developing it. Family history is one of the strongest genetic risk factors for hidradenitis, especially when symptoms appear in more than one generation.
Gamma-secretase genes: Rare inherited changes in genes such as NCSTN, PSENEN, and PSEN1 have been found in some families with hidradenitis. These genes help skin and hair follicle cells communicate normally, so changes can make blocked follicles and ongoing inflammation more likely.
Many genes: For most people living with hidradenitis, no single gene explains why it happens. Instead, several small inherited differences likely add up to raise risk, and people with the same risk factor can have very different experiences.
Dominant inheritance: In some families, a gene change can be passed down in a dominant pattern, meaning each child has a 1 in 2, or 50%, chance of inheriting that change. Even when the same change runs in a family, symptoms can start at different ages and range from mild to severe.
Lifestyle risk factors
Several everyday habits can influence how often hidradenitis flares, how severe inflammation becomes, and how well treatment works. In hidradenitis suppurativa, lifestyle risk factors matter mainly because they can worsen friction, sweating, immune activation, and skin irritation in already vulnerable areas. Understanding how lifestyle affects hidradenitis can help people reduce triggers and support long-term symptom control.
Smoking is one of the strongest modifiable factors linked with worse hidradenitis activity. It can promote inflammation and is associated with more frequent flares and more severe disease.
Higher body weight can increase skin friction, sweating, and pressure in body folds where hidradenitis often develops. It is also linked with greater systemic inflammation, which may worsen pain, drainage, and recurrence.
Tight clothing, repeated rubbing, and aggressive hair removal can irritate affected skin and trigger new painful nodules. Reducing mechanical stress in prone areas may help limit flare-ups.
In some people, highly processed diets or foods that seem to trigger inflammation may be associated with worse symptoms. Paying attention to personal food patterns may help identify lifestyle risk factors for hidradenitis suppurativa, although triggers vary from person to person.
Risk prevention
Hidradenitis, often called hidradenitis suppurativa, cannot always be fully prevented because some people are more prone to it than others. Still, there are practical ways to lower the risk of developing hidradenitis or reduce flares if you already live with it, especially in areas where skin rubs together. Prevention isn’t about perfection, it’s about small steps that add up. If you are worried about the early symptoms of hidradenitis, getting care sooner may help limit scarring and repeated flare-ups.
Extra body weight can increase skin friction, sweating, and inflammation, which may raise the risk of hidradenitis or make it worse. Gradual, sustainable weight loss can help some people have fewer flares over time.
Smoking is strongly linked with hidradenitis and can make the condition harder to control. Quitting may lower flare frequency and improve how well treatment works.
Tight clothing, rough seams, and repeated rubbing in the underarms, groin, or under the breasts can irritate skin prone to hidradenitis. Looser, breathable fabrics and gentle daily habits may help protect these areas.
Harsh scrubbing, aggressive shaving, and strongly scented products can irritate sensitive skin and trigger bumps in people with hidradenitis. Mild cleansers and careful hair removal choices may reduce irritation.
Can you prevent Hidradenitis?
Hidradenitis usually cannot be fully prevented, because it seems to result from a mix of body chemistry, family risk, and other factors people cannot control. Still, many living with hidradenitis can lower the chance of flare-ups by not smoking, working toward a healthy weight if needed, and reducing rubbing and irritation in areas where skin touches skin. Even with these steps, it may still happen, so getting care early can help.
Transmission
Hidradenitis, often called hidradenitis suppurativa, is not contagious and does not spread through touch, kissing, sex, or shared towels or clothing. For many living with hidradenitis, the more useful question is how hidradenitis is inherited: it can run in families, and in some families a parent can pass down a higher chance of developing it. Even then, not everyone who inherits that tendency will have symptoms, and many people with hidradenitis have no clear family history at all. This is because hidradenitis is usually linked to a mix of inherited risk and other noninfectious factors, while a small number of cases may begin with a new genetic change in that person.
When to test your genes
For hidradenitis suppurativa, genetic testing is not routinely used for early detection or to guide treatment. It may be worth discussing with a dermatologist or genetics specialist if HS starts very young, runs strongly in your family, or appears alongside unusual features that suggest a rare inherited syndrome.
Diagnosis
Hidradenitis suppurativa is usually diagnosed by a clinician based on the pattern of painful lumps, drainage, and scarring in areas where skin rubs, such as the armpits, groin, under the breasts, or between the buttocks. Many living with hidradenitis suppurativa find that symptoms come and go for months or years before the condition is named, especially when it looks like repeated boils or ingrown hairs. Doctors usually begin with a close look at where the bumps occur, how often they return, and whether tunnels or scars have formed under the skin. Some diagnoses are clear after a single visit, while others take more time.
A doctor examines the affected areas for tender nodules, abscesses, drainage, and scarring in typical body folds. The location and repeated nature of these changes are central to the diagnosis of hidradenitis suppurativa.
Your clinician will ask when the lumps started, how often they come back, and whether they burst or leak fluid. They also look for a pattern of flares over time, which helps separate hidradenitis suppurativa from a one-time skin infection.
Doctors check for sinus tracts, which are small channels under the skin that can connect inflamed areas. These findings often point to more established disease and help stage its severity.
Swabs, blood work, and other lab tests may help rule out common conditions such as bacterial infection or other causes of recurrent boils. These tests do not confirm hidradenitis suppurativa on their own, but they can support how hidradenitis suppurativa is diagnosed.
How is Hidradenitis diagnosed?
Hidradenitis is usually diagnosed by a doctor or skin specialist looking at your skin and asking about your symptoms, especially whether painful lumps, draining spots, or scars keep coming back in places where skin rubs, such as the armpits, groin, buttocks, or under the breasts. There is no single blood test for it, so the diagnosis is mostly based on this repeated pattern over time and on skin changes such as deep sore bumps, small channels under the skin, and scarring. Tests like a skin swab, blood tests, or sometimes an ultrasound or a small skin sample may be used if the doctor needs to rule out an infection or another skin condition, and genetic testing is not usually needed.
Stages of Hidradenitis
Painful lumps, drainage, and scarring in skin folds can affect walking, exercise, work, and even what clothes feel comfortable. In hidradenitis, doctors usually describe severity using Hurley stages rather than a strict timeline, because symptoms can flare and settle over time instead of moving forward in a neat sequence. Many people feel reassured knowing what their tests can—and can’t—show, and the stage is usually based on a skin exam, where the spots are, and whether tunnels or scars have formed.
Stage I
Small painful bumps or boils may come and go, often in the armpits, groin, under the breasts, or between the buttocks. There are no lasting tunnels under the skin and little or no scarring. These can look like the early symptoms of hidradenitis, but they are often mistaken for ingrown hairs or repeated boils.
Stage II
Lumps tend to come back in the same areas, and some people develop deeper pockets under the skin or narrow tunnels that connect spots. Scarring starts to appear, but the affected areas are still separated rather than joining into one large network.
Stage III
There are widespread inflamed areas with multiple connected tunnels, ongoing drainage, and thicker scarring. For many living with hidradenitis, this stage can make movement, sleep, and daily hygiene much harder.
Outlook and prognosis
The outlook for people with hidradenitis varies widely: many have a chronic, relapsing course with flares that can lead to pain, scarring, drainage, and major effects on daily life and mental health. Prognosis is generally better when the condition is recognized early and treated consistently, while more extensive disease, smoking, obesity, and delayed care are linked to worse long-term outcomes. Although hidradenitis is not usually directly fatal, severe disease can rarely lead to serious complications such as widespread infection, fistulas, lymphedema, anemia, and squamous cell carcinoma in long-standing affected areas. People with hidradenitis also appear to have higher overall risks of cardiovascular disease, metabolic disease, depression, and suicide, which can affect life expectancy and quality of life. With modern medical and surgical treatment, many patients can reduce flares and improve function, but complete remission is not always achievable.
Long-term effects
For many, hidradenitis can affect far more than the skin over time. Repeated flares may leave lasting changes such as scars, tunnels under the skin, ongoing pain, and drainage that can interfere with walking, sitting, exercise, sleep, work, and relationships. It’s important to remember that long-term doesn’t always mean progressive, because the course can vary widely from one person to another. Thinking about the long-term effects helps set realistic expectations and explains why regular follow-up matters.
Hidradenitis often comes and goes in the same body areas, with painful lumps returning over months or years. Even people whose early symptoms of hidradenitis were mild can later have more frequent or longer-lasting flares.
Ongoing inflammation can leave thick scars and rope-like bands in the skin. In some people, tunnels form under the skin and may keep draining between flares.
Pain can become a long-term problem, not just something that happens during a flare. For many, symptoms can make it hard to sit comfortably, walk long distances, lift an arm, or sleep through the night.
Persistent drainage can soak clothing or dressings and may come with an unpleasant odor. Many people notice small adjustments—like carrying extra bandages or changing clothes more often—become part of daily life.
How is it to live with Hidradenitis?
Living with hidradenitis suppurativa can mean coping with painful, recurring lumps, drainage, and scarring in sensitive areas such as the armpits, groin, or under the breasts, and that can make ordinary things like walking, exercise, getting dressed, or sitting for long periods much harder than they look from the outside. Many people with hidradenitis also deal with fatigue, disrupted sleep, and the emotional weight of unpredictability, because flares can appear suddenly and affect work, school, intimacy, and confidence. The condition can ripple outward too, with family members or partners sometimes helping with wound care, laundry, transportation, or emotional support, so open communication and good medical care can make daily life feel more manageable for everyone involved.
Treatment and drugs
Hidradenitis is usually treated with a mix of skin care, pain relief, and medicines to calm the inflammation, because this condition often comes and goes over time. Early treatment for hidradenitis can help reduce painful lumps, drainage, and scarring, and for many this can mean fewer flares that disrupt walking, exercise, work, or sleep. Doctors may use antibiotic medicines, anti-inflammatory drugs, hormone-based treatment for some people, or injectable biologic medicines that target the immune system when symptoms are more severe. Treatment plans often combine several approaches. If hidradenitis causes deep tunnels under the skin or repeated abscesses, procedures such as draining a painful area, removing affected tissue, or laser treatment may also be part of care, along with support for quitting smoking and reaching a healthy weight if those factors apply.
Can you cure Hidradenitis?
No, there is no permanent cure for hidradenitis right now. But treatment can often help a lot by lowering pain, swelling, drainage, and flare-ups, and some people may also need procedures or surgery to treat deeper, repeated lumps and tunnels under the skin.
Non-drug treatment
For many living with hidradenitis suppurativa, treatment is not only about medicine or procedures but also about easing friction, pain, drainage, and day-to-day triggers. Managing this condition often includes skin care, wound care, weight support when needed, and help with stopping smoking, because these steps can reduce flares for some people. Non-drug treatment for hidradenitis suppurativa usually works best when it is tailored to where the sores occur, how often they come back, and how much they affect daily life.
Gentle washing with a non-irritating cleanser can help keep affected skin cleaner and more comfortable. Scrubbing, harsh soaps, and rough washcloths can make tender areas feel worse.
A warm compress may help ease pain and encourage some draining from a swollen lump. Use warmth that feels soothing, not hot enough to burn already sensitive skin.
Dressings can absorb drainage, reduce rubbing, and help protect clothing during a workday or while sleeping. Some non-drug options are delivered by specialists, and a wound care nurse can suggest bandages that fit body folds better and hurt less when removed.
Soft, breathable, loose-fitting clothes and underwear can reduce rubbing in the armpits, groin, under the breasts, or between skin folds. Many people with hidradenitis suppurativa find this especially helpful on hot days or during exercise.
Your genes may have an impact on how drugs work for you
For people living with hidradenitis, small inherited differences can affect how the body handles certain medicines, which may help explain why one treatment works well for one person but not for another, or why side effects feel stronger. This can matter with medicines often used for hidradenitis, such as antibiotics, pain relievers, and immune-targeting treatments, because genes can influence both how quickly the body breaks a drug down and how strongly the immune system responds to it. Even so, genetic testing is not a routine part of choosing hidradenitis treatment right now, and doctors usually adjust care based on symptoms, response over time, and side effects.
Pharmacological treatments
Living with hidradenitis can mean painful lumps, drainage, and flare-ups that interrupt sleep, work, and everyday routines. Medicines for hidradenitis are used to calm inflammation, treat infection when it is present, ease pain, and help prevent new flares. Treatment often depends on how severe the disease is, where it affects the body, and how often symptoms come back. Not everyone responds to the same medication in the same way, so people with hidradenitis may need changes over time.
Clindamycin 1% applied to the skin is often used for milder hidradenitis, especially when bumps are limited to small areas. It may help reduce inflamed spots and drainage, though it usually is not enough on its own for more extensive disease.
Doxycycline and minocycline are common first options because they can reduce inflammation as well as treat bacterial overgrowth. If these do not help enough, doctors may use clindamycin plus rifampin for several weeks or months in more persistent hidradenitis.
Adalimumab is the best-known biologic for moderate to severe hidradenitis and is used to lower ongoing inflammation and reduce flares. Infliximab is sometimes used when symptoms remain difficult to control, including in people with early symptoms of hidradenitis that quickly become frequent or severe.
Some women with hidradenitis may improve with spironolactone or certain combined birth control pills, especially when flares seem linked to menstrual cycles or acne-like symptoms. These medicines are not right for everyone, so pregnancy plans and other health conditions need to be reviewed first.
Genetic influences
If hidradenitis suppurativa shows up in several close relatives, inherited factors may be part of the reason. It’s natural to ask whether family history plays a role. Most people with hidradenitis suppurativa do not have one single gene causing it, but in a small number of families, rare inherited gene changes can make the condition much more likely. Genes do not act alone, though, and smoking, body weight, hormones, and immune-system activity can all influence whether symptoms appear and how severe they become. For many living with hidradenitis suppurativa, this helps explain why one relative may have occasional painful lumps while another has more frequent flares, tunnels under the skin, or scarring. Genetic testing is not routine for most people with hidradenitis suppurativa, but it may be discussed when the condition starts young or appears across several generations.
Is Hidradenitis genetic?
Genetics matter in hidradenitis, and inherited differences in immune and skin-related genes can raise risk. Still, hidradenitis is not caused by genes alone, and hormones, smoking, weight, and other factors also play a role.
Having a genetic risk is not necessarily a diagnosis
Genetic variants are a usual part of being human, and they are common in the general population. Most do not directly affect health and simply reflect normal human variation. For many genes, having a variant associated with a condition suggests a possible link rather than a certain diagnosis, especially when several genes and environmental factors are involved. In some cases, though, one well-understood variant in a particular gene can be enough to confirm a diagnosis.
Pharmacogenetics—how genetics influence drug effects
People with hidradenitis can have very different responses to the same treatment, even when their skin problems seem similar at the start. Some inherited differences appear to affect the inflammatory pathways involved in hidradenitis, which may help explain why one person improves with antibiotics, hormone treatment, or a biologic medicine while another does not. Beyond trial and error, genetics offers another way to understand these differences, but genetic testing for hidradenitis treatment is still an emerging area rather than routine care. Right now, doctors usually choose treatment based more on symptoms, exam findings, other health conditions, and past medication response than on a gene test. In some cases, inherited differences may also change how quickly the body breaks down certain drugs, which can affect side effects or how well a medicine works, although this is not yet used widely to guide hidradenitis care. For many living with hidradenitis, this means treatment often needs careful adjustment over time, and a family history does not by itself predict which medicine will work best.
Interactions with other conditions
Hidradenitis can affect much more than the skin, and many living with hidradenitis also have other inflammatory conditions that can shape how symptoms feel day to day. Doctors call it a “comorbidity” when two conditions occur together. Well-known links include Crohn’s disease and other inflammatory bowel diseases, some forms of arthritis, acne-related disorders, and mood conditions such as depression or anxiety, which can become harder to manage when painful flares, drainage, and sleep disruption are frequent. Hidradenitis is also more common in people with obesity, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome, which may raise the risk of heart and blood vessel disease over time. In real life, this can mean a flare under the arms or groin happens at the same time joint pain, bowel symptoms, or fatigue are acting up, making it harder to tell which problem needs attention first. If you have hidradenitis and another long-term illness, coordinated care can help make treatment safer and more effective, especially when different medicines may affect inflammation, infection risk, or wound healing.
How genes can cause diseases
Humans have more than 20,000 genes, each carrying out one or a few specific functions in the body. One gene instructs the body to digest lactose from milk, another tells the body how to build strong bones and another prevents the body's cells from beginning to multiply uncontrollably and developing into cancer. As all of these genes combined are the building instructions for our body, a defect in one of these genes can have severe health consequences.
Through decades of genetic research, we know the genetic code of any healthy/functional human gene. We have also identified that in certain positions on a gene, some individuals may have a different genetic letter from the one you have. We call these hotspots "Genetic Variations" or "Variants" in short. In many cases, studies have been able to show that having the genetic letter "G" in the position makes you healthy, but having the letter "A" in the same position disrupts the gene function and causes a disease. Genopedia allows you to view these variants in genes and summarizes all that we know from scientific research, which genetic letters (Genotype) have good or bad consequences on your health or on your traits.
What other conditions can cause similar symptoms to Hidradenitis?
Hidradenitis can look a lot like repeated boils, infected hair follicles, acne cysts, or an infected skin cyst because all of these can cause painful lumps, swelling, and leaking fluid. Depending on where it shows up, it may also be mistaken for an ingrown hair or a cyst near the tailbone, often called a pilonidal cyst. When the lumps keep coming back in places like the armpits, groin, under the breasts, or buttocks, hidradenitis becomes more likely than a one-time skin infection.
History
Painful lumps in places like the armpits or groin have likely been troubling people for a very long time, even before doctors had a clear name for the problem. Many living with hidradenitis know how disruptive it can be: a sore area may start as what feels like a boil, then come back in the same spot weeks or months later. In the medical literature, the condition became more clearly described during the 1800s, when doctors began linking these recurring deep skin lumps and draining areas into a single disorder now known as hidradenitis suppurativa.
At first, hidradenitis was mainly understood by what could be seen on the skin. Early doctors thought it came from sweat glands alone, which helped shape the name, but that explanation turned out to be incomplete. As skin medicine improved, specialists recognized that the condition is more complex and involves blocked hair follicles, ongoing inflammation, and a tendency for the disease to recur over time.
In recent decades, awareness has grown, and that has changed the history of hidradenitis in an important way. What was once often missed, misnamed, or mistaken for repeated infections is now more widely recognized as a long-term inflammatory skin condition. This has helped more people get diagnosed earlier, including those whose early symptoms of hidradenitis were brushed off for years as “just boils” or poor hygiene.
Modern research has also made the picture clearer. Doctors now understand that hidradenitis can range from mild to severe, and that it often overlaps with other inflammatory conditions. Just as importantly, the history of hidradenitis includes a long period when many people felt embarrassed, blamed, or unheard. That is slowly changing as knowledge improves, stigma is challenged, and treatment options continue to expand.