My DH also suffers from this horrible skin condition. His doctors will only order him Betnovate cream which is cortisone based. He's seen many doctors about it and they all end up ordering Betnovate.

DH's condition started after he had a back injury at work and his physio sent him to a hydrotherapy pool. The water was very warm and the chlorine content very high and DH's skin got "burnt" from the combination of heat and chlorine.

This was about 5 years ago now and it still hasn't eased. One dermatologist did a blood test and although I can't remember the readings or the name of the test now, it was an allergy blood test. IGG or similar. Anyway it was supposed to be under 10 or under 100 or something, but my DH's level was over 200,000. The Dermo said she'd never in all her medical life ever seen a reading that high. 5 years later it's down to about 5000. Still way over normal, but no where near as high as it was.