What Do Chickenpox Look Like?
Appearance of Chicken Pox The chicken pox rash begins on the trunk and spreads to the face and extremities. The chicken pox lesion starts as a 2-4 mm red papule which develops an irregular outline (rose petal). A thin-walled, clear vesicle (dew drop) develops on top of the area of redness. This “dew drop on a rose petal” lesion is very characteristic for chicken pox. After about 8-12 hours the fluid in the vesicle gets cloudy and the vesicle breaks leaving a crust. The fluid is highly contagious, but once the lesion crusts over, it is not considered contagious. The crust usually falls off after 7 days sometimes leaving a craterlike scar. Although one lesion goes through this complete cycle in about 7 days, another hallmark of chicken pox is the fact that new lesions crop up every day for several days. Therefore, it may take about a week until new lesions stop appearing and existing lesions crust over. Children are not sent back to school until all lesions have crusted over.
