Dry rash from swimming (any ideas as he loves to swim?)

[dasiychain]

My 19 month old son has a small rash on his body, looks like eczema. It only comes up were in patchs on his body, which are just were my hands sit on his body when I hold him up when he is swimming.

He loves to play in the water and the rash does not seem to bother him but I dont want it turn into some thing more. I have problems with my skin and it is such a pain.

I cant use chemical creams for very long myself so dont want to start puting cream on it every day if I can help it (as that was how my own skin got bad)so to keep it drying out at the minute I use rolled oats in a fabric bag in his bath seems to work at the minute.

I just wanted to know if any one else had the same problem after taking a child swimming?

Does any one know some thing that I could try to use his skin before swimming to stop the problem at the cause?

Any ideas please?

Try Vaseline - I always use it on my sons eczema before swimming - but he has definite places wheer he gets it - more difficult if it is more all over !

my dses go swimming covered in vaseline - bog standard stuff, it waterproofs them and stops them getting worse eczema due to the swimming. Also shower them thoroughly when they get home, in plain water.
btw the vaseline makes 'em more slippery than a flippin eel, but hey ho

You can get barrier creams to put on before swimming.

I got given some by a friends friend who was a medical rep, but sure your dr could prescribe some for your dh.

You can get special eczema suits for swimming in see here.

You could smother him in aveeno then put the suit on. You will need the suit as with loads of cream on they are too slipy to hold safely.

yeah, smother in an emollient ointment. vaseline, epaderm

Great! Im not the only one to have this problem.

Thanks for the ideas, I had no ideas were to start with creams and things as don't/can't use many of them so your advice is great.
We will try Vaseline next time we go swimming and I'm guna look into getting swimming suit for him.

One more quick question:
I can't get things online does any one know a shop I can go to get a good one?

Thanks for all the help!

I've just been reading the ad for the eczema suit. It's made me think - the 'amateur' version that i used to do with ds1 8 yrs ago was cover him in vaseline then put him in the UV swim/beach suit which had long sleeves and shorts - i got it in Boots' sale Anyone who has used the 'real thing' can you comment whether this sort of thing would still work if daisy can't buy online?

My dd has eczema all over and when we swim we use a UV suit, (can get them in sainsburys, asda, most shops selling swimwear, but those two are specifically cheaper) Infact the cheaper the better really as you are not protecting from the sun...so it does not matter about the quality, just any suit that will cover most of the body.
If you swim regularly you will find that the emmolient will probably damage the suit over time, as the elasticity of the suit will erode. Greasy, oily creams are better as aveeno , for example will dissolve a lot quicker than epaderm/ 50/50 , vaseline etc. Just try to avoid the foot area, (I still have to put in the creases by the ankly though) as it will be slippery for them to walk....

Diprobase is excellent if applied after swimming.

I don't have one so I can't really say if there is any difference, but i would imagine that a cheap UV suit would do the same job.

My dd really suffered when we went on holiday. We were in Portugal but the pharmacist looked at her skin and we explained about the effect of the pool/sea/sand & suncream and she gave us a barrier cream which worked a treat. I'm not sure if you can get something similar over here, it was called A-Derma Exomega for atopic skin. It didn't have any 'slippery eel' effect!
Good luck

Thanks for all the help