How do "you" pronounce eczema?

/ˈɛɡzɪmə/, /ˈɛksɪmə/, /ˈɛksmə/

As I no longer live in the UK I don't usually hear how eczema is pronounced, so I've always pronounced it as ig-zee-muh but recently my English boyfriend told me that the only correct pronunciation is ˈɛksmə (the second e- is silent), and he's quite adamant about it! He considers my pronunciation as nothing short of an abomination. Listen to the first British speaker on Forvo to hear the "correct" pronunciation of eczema.

However, when I checked online I saw that there are three ways of pronouncing this term.

I would like to know which pronunciation is most dominant in British English and in American English. And why the second e- is sometimes silent in eckz(e)ma.

Solution 1:

I just took an unscientific poll of North American professional actors (read: searched the web for eczema commercial), and "egzema" /ˈɛɡzɪmə/ was the most common, followed by the similar "eksema" /ˈɛksɪmə/. I hadn't heard "egzeema" /ɪɡˈzi:mə/ until today.

A TV ad for Elidel (pimecrolimus) cream 1% calls it a prescription drug to treat "egzema".
Another Elidel ad with an animated character also says "egzema".
A commercial for Gold Bond opens with a woman talking about "an eksema flareup" but it's kind of close. The voiceover says "egzema relief cream".
"There are better ways to soothe egzeema" than spreading ice cream all over your skin. "Try Polysporin egzeema essentials".
"Cortizone-10 intensive healing egzema lotion"
Neosporin because "Americans suffer from eksema"

The "egzema" and "eksema" pronunciations represent a common phonological process called voicing assimilation: "egzema" and "egzeema" are anticipatory while "eksema" is lag.

Solution 2:

Merriam-Webster and my own personal experience with American English suggest pronouncing it ˈeg-zə-mə

Cambridge Dictionary Online lists the pronunciation as ˈek.sɪ.mə and provides audio of English and American pronunciation.

Solution 3:

You may want to check here: http://youglish.com/search/eczema

The cons: it doesn’t indicate the location of the speakers.
The pros: they are professional speakers.

They added accent support.

Solution 4:

I'm a lifelong US resident and the daughter of a dermatologist. I grew up hearing my father pronounce it ig-zee-muh. He grew up in Chicago and did his residency at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota. However, he moved us to North Carolina when I was a baby. So though I always said "ig-zee-muh" (accent on second syllable, long e) I recall most locals saying "egg-ze-muh" (accent on first syllable, pronounced like the word "egg", second e more of a schwa). I've never, ever heard the word spoken as only two syllables.

Solution 5:

ˈɛksɪmə. I am a U.S. native (Chicago). I have also commonly heard ˈɛɡzɪmə, but never ˈɛksmə, as far as I can recall.

These were the only pronunciations I was familiar with till I was surprised years ago to learn that the skin cream Noxzema, pronounced nɒkˈsiːmə (nok-SEE-ma) and sold under that name for nearly a century, was so named because it was advertised as a treatment for eczema. That is, the name of the cream assumes a pronunciation of ɛkˈsiːmə (ek-SEE-ma) or ɛɡˈziːmə (eg-ZEE-ma) for the word eczema. Prior to hearing this bit of information, I had never heard this pronunciation for eczema.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noxzema