Confused about Mumsnetters advice for eczema suffers

[StrawberryMartini]

This post has been brought about through reading many of the eczema threads on this board.

The general advice given on here is to slap on emollients and hydrocortisone, which is a powerful steroid. Emollients are all petroleum based and full to the brim of nasty chemicals, which can exacerbate the problem. Hydrocortisone can cause the skin to thin if used too often.

The other issue I have is that hardly anyone seems to tackle the cause of eczema. It is nearly always caused by an allergy to something - the common causes are dairy, wheat, washing powder, creams, central heating, pet allergies and so on. GP's never want to get to the cause of the eczema and just dole out chemicals.

The link between dairy and eczema is proven, and yet few people suggest leaving it out of the child's diet, and when it is suggested, people worry about making such a 'drastic' change to their diet. FGS half the world survives quite happily without it.

Very few people suggest natural remedies such as organic creams, perfume-free washing powder (don't use conditioner!), or changes to diet.

RANT OVER. And sorry to those who have suggested the above and whose posts I have missed.

well as one of the people who does suggest other things - and there are many alternative suggestions posted on mumsnet - I think you're going too far. Eczema is a complex and unpleasant condition and the causes vary considerably from one person to another. A suffering child may need the quick relief that hydrocortisone can bring. Thinning of the skin is a risk, especially if too much is applied at once, but one that is often overstated.

As for dairy - other countries do not eat our type of diet and they don't always live long enough to suffer from osteoporosis. Fine if you are prepared to live on a "stone age " type diet but most people are going to eat some processed food and most children want to visit friends who will eat such food.

Dairy is the easiest way for a child to get calcium. Before excluding it completely eczema sufferers can try probiotics - which help digest milk - or goats milk. Many children benefit from one or the other or both.

interesting OP, though - it's good to look at all aspects of a problem.
If my child suffered from excema I'd certainly look at the food reaction route, as well as immediate relief. But cows milk makes me ill in other ways (headaches and pouring nose), so I am aware how powerful reactions to food can be.

(tatt - there are plenty of long lived people in china and japan though)

i tried lots of treatments

ds hated goatsmilk

loves cheese

was very bad when we had hot summers

i also to not use fabric conditioner
use cotton fabrics

luckily now for what ever reason he is much better

I have the opposite view - I see lots of threads about avoiding HC and creams prescribed by the GP

HC is safe. At 1% when used for flare ups it will not cause skin thinning. It can provide very effective relief.

I don't think people should be advised to cut out food groups for children unless this is under the supervision of a doctor

I tried cutting out dairy for ds but he hated alternative milks, yoghurts and cheeses - must admit once I tried them myself, I could see why he didn't want them!! Luckily since I've been bathing him in with those Aveeno Oat Sachet things (can't remember what they are called) and using Aveeno cream on him afterwards, he's been MUCH better. All the other creams just reacted when he had sore skin, this stuff all PREVENTS him getting it. I found with ds it was baths that made him worse, we are in a hard water area and I now only bath him twice a week but he's so much better. So it couldn't have been diet for him

It was definitely dairy for my DS. We were living in Bulgaria when he was a baby and his skin was always itchy and his face was red and blotchy. From about 16 months I started switching him from formula to cow's milk and his skin got much worse. Went to a paed and she said well it's obv the milk. Cut out dairy for a year and see how it goes. She recommended Nestle Nan hypoallergenic formula which DS took to no problem. We were lucky enough to be able to buy nice goat's cheese which he liked and some goat's cheese spread. He still had the odd bit of chocolate but I noticed that while chocolate made him worse.

A year later started re-introducing dairy and he was fine. Skin still gets itchy but never the full blown excema.

I didn't say it was always diet - I just said there's almost always a cause which is rarely investigated by GPs. Glad you found a solution!

Oh.....I know about the dairy and agree that there is usually a cause and Dr's should do more than just prescribe this stuff! For me I'm convinced it was down to the hard water! I used to get really angry with the Dr's because it was like 'prescription and get out of there!' I ended up doing my own research due to the stuff being prescribed not working for ds - thank god for Aveeno!! (in our case )

on this thread people talk about cutting out dairy, the link between processed foods and eczema, how to reduce the amount of steroids being used and non-chemical creams.

this one mentions swaddling, bathing and soya oil, the irritation factor in aqueous cream, changing diets and not using soaps. People talk about seeing dermatologists. Also using oats and gentle washing powders.

here people recommend dropping dairy from your own diet whilst breastfeeding, soya and alternative milks.

this thread is ALL about alternative eczema therapy.

this thread sees people saying that they don't like to use hydrocortisone for too long, the possibility of reacting to other things like suncream and changing the central heating settings.

Eczema and allergy links are discussed here along with washing powders and SLS.

here there are mentions of products from Holland and Barratt, bicarb baths and other natural products.

Now, you may think that I have gone too far, but these were the first 7 links that came up when I searched for "eczema". Every single thread that I looked at offered solutions for the condition that were not steroid or petroleum based.

Of course people use these methods though, to suggest that no-one should would be ridiculous. But it seemed to me like you just wanted to make a point and just made up a random opinion about what posters say without actually checking.

I have read a lot of eczema threads (it is relevant to me) and never once have I thought that the overwhelming opinion is to slap on the chemicals, quite the opposite.

Thanks Lazy - certainly not living up to your name! I am an MN regular but keep forgetting to look at the allergies board as it rarely comes up on active convos. I must have somehow missed those threads - thanks for pointing them out to me.

I still stand by my op that the general advice is chemicals.

so do you think chemicals are bad, and all natural stuff is good?

Strawberry, we are full to the brim with chemicals. Everything on the Earth is made up of chemicals.

Organic creams are chemicals, as is perfume free washing powder

Can I just ask ,is goats milk not still a dairy product?

I definitely think dairy is a factor in ds' eczema ,changing to goats milk made no difference for him.

There are so many different causes of eczema it is not helpful to be precriptive about things. What will help one person will not help another. Sadly you need to 'shop around' until you find something that does help.

For my kids the biggest trigger was the weather! There was no effect of dairy at all. I can't get the weather to change, and found that aquious cream was excellent for them. But it doesn't help everyone.

Ranting about what helps you is great, but don't expect everyone to agree with you, as their ecaema may have a different trugger and a different 'cure'

I have tried loads of things with ds

switching to ecover

probiotics ,"natural" creams

cutting dairy

removing the dog from the house for a few months

he has had allergy testing.

nothing has improved his eczema

He does seems to be growing out of it slightly now.

I don't agree with you that mumsnetters advocate the standard emollient and steroid only,but ime steroids can be a godsend for ds.

and were for us too ggirl. Just to knock 'the flare' and then the emolients took caree of it for 90% of the time.

Like you, mine are growing out of it now, thankfully.

nightynight - you're right, there are. But their diet is very different to ours, it's not just that they take milk out. They get more calcium for vegetables than we do because their diet is more vegetarian with only traces of meat. If you want to remove dairy from your diet then you'd be well advised to eat a mainly vegetarian diet with only small amounts of meat and plenty of fruit to help you absorb iron from the vegetables.

SM if you're really interested - and not just being a troll - then there are lots of MN threads on eczema. On some of them you'll find people who have tried excluding dairy without any success. Look hard enough and you'll find mums who have tried most things known to women (including extra fatty acids and less bathing) and their child STILL has eczema.

ggirl goats milk is still dairy but the proteins are slightly different to cows milk and its more readily digested. For that reason it helps some children with eczema. Its easier to have goats milk than to be totally dairy free and it does help a significant minority.

A troll .

That's very funny!

I did say that it is nearly always caused by something - obviously sometimes it's just there for no reason at all. And I didn't say dairy was the only cause, just a common one.

This is an internet forum.
It is populated by all sorts of people.
Some are doctors, nurses or work in the alternative medicine field but mainly when someone asks for advice all sorts of people will share their knowledge and/or opinions.

If someone bases their medical choices on what they read on Mumsnet - then more fool them.

only read op.

I think you are simplifying things hugely.

I have noticed that often on mn posts, eczema is defined as 'dry skin'. I - and many many others - know eczema to be much much worse than that. Broekn, weeping, sore skin that develops one infection after another that sweeps aross the whole body.

Unless things have changed fairly recently, I do not think the link between dairy and eczema has been proven. It is a very long and difficult business to rule out one thing after another as a trigger and it is impossible to stop treating your eczema riddled child while you spend weeks eliminating one thing after anotjer.

The main cause of DS1s eczema is food allergies (wheat and milk) BUT it isn't simply a case of avoiding them, there are other things that can cause a flare up too. The weather plays a major part, any major changes in temperature can cause quite a bad flare up, damp cold weather causes problems with his asthma. We do still use hydrocortisone and diprobase on his skin because even though we know the major causes of his eczema it's never completely gone.