Antihistamine for baby with eczema?

[Queenside]

Does anybody have any experience of the use of antihistamine for babies with eczema? Our baby wakes up miserable trying scratch her eczema and it seems to be getting worse despite our use of emollients.

Agree you need to find what is triggering the eczema. Try keeping a food diary. For DD it was milk and egg, both directly and through my breastmilk. GP prescribed Piriton and mild steroid creams help too.

Hi , my lo (3mths) has had a bad bout of cheek eczema and was also admitted in the hospital for IV antibiotics as it had got infected and was taking too long to respond to the antibiotics. Here's what Ive learnt:

1. Keep baby moistuirized. ALL the time, there is never too much
2. Get your GP to prescribe you the different emollients available - and see what works best and whats the easiest to use. I use double base whne we go out as its easier to apply and can be put on frequently vs the more waxy ones which we use at night.
3. Baby will keep rubbing it off, so re point #1. Its never enough. The dryness is what makes it ichy. Just think of it like when you (may) get dry skin on your legs in the winter.
4. Try exclusion in your diet if your bf. But dont do it all at once. Go off one thing at a time. This may or may not help identify the trigger for baby's ezcema. It could also not be anything you're consuming. But its easier for you to control your diet that for your to control baby's. Get nutritional advise when you do this.
5. Antihistamines help. But use with discretion. I only use it when I see baby getting disturbed during the night. If your LO

SusanaD point 12 I think you mean Stellaria cream, not sure about using it on one so little take advice and patch test, but it's an anti-itch natural remedy with chickweed.stellaria cream.

If you're concerned about the amount of chemicals/petroleum there are natural products here Mother and Baby. I have used the baby balm and baby lotion in conjunction to treat eczema on my DCs.

However, I am amazed at how many above have not had any form of allergy testing. DS has multiple food allergies and was diagnosed at 3mos with dairy allergy, he had the most horrendous eczema, and within a week of cutting dairy out of my diet his eczema had pretty much cleared up now he just gets normal patches of kids eczema. DS had blood tests at 6 mos for food allergies, although he was getting hives, swelling and throwing up on contact with certain foods.

#mum2twoloudbabies: Thanks for the response. Actually it is Stelatria: www.mustelausa.com/mustela/content/stelatria. Cant seem to find anyone who stocks it in London.

Re the allergy testing, not so easy to get done. ive been trying to get my GP, health visitor and the docs we met in the hospital to run allergy tests on LO. But they tell me its difficult to do on flared up eczema skin. Strangely, when i read up on it, it seems the test is done on the back - where LO has clear skin. They also said that they need to know what they are testing for. I always thought that they do a broad spectrum of tests and then identify the allergens.

How did you manage to get yours done? Is there a age limit only after which the test can be done?

Diet exclusions are a bit like a shot in the dark for me now, the combo of antibiotics, creams etc could be the reason LO's flare up and infection has subsided; so cant tell for sure if he was actually allergic to cow milk protein. But Im staying off it just to be safe ....

SusanaD ah hadn't heard of Stelatria very interesting though.

The only testing we've had done are blood tests as I believe skin patch testing is not used on babies/toddlers, although I guess this may be different in different areas and with different allergies.

We initially saw a paediatric immunology consultant privately when DS was 3mos no testing just a general assessment of his symptoms and family history, he was in no doubt that he had a dairy allergy. We had been getting the run around by HVs and GP before and this was the kick up the bum that our GP needed because we were then referred to see a dietician as I needed an exclusion diet and DS needed to be under the dietician (NICE guidelines insist on this). I suspect you are at the same stage - trying different creams to find the right one but I knew something wasn't right because DD had had 'normal' eczema and this was not the same.

Our dietician then got us into the NHS system under a consultant who did blood tests sometime around 6mos although not before he had touched wheat and his face and lips swelled up and he was covered in hives (just from touching it) . They then tested for the common food allergens dairy, wheat, egg, peanut, shellfish, soya and he was allergic to them all except shellfish. These are so common in children that the NHS actually have prepared leaflets for feeding children excluding these allergens.

The good news is that at 2.7 he is no longer allergic to soya and we are challenging him on dairy which is going really well. He gets blood tests once a year and sees his consultant about every 6-9mos (all NHS) and last week he said he expects him to fully grow out of them all with the possible exception of wheat because it is so severe.

What I have learnt is that you have to know your rights (NICE guidelines), you have to be prepared to make a complete nuisance of yourself with the GP, consultants etc. until they listen to you and go in armed with as much info as possible and occasionally you may need to throw some money at it, if possible, like the private consult we had at the start. Private consultants tend to be thinking less about budget and overfull clinics and more on giving you a full assessment. The sad fact is that allergy clinics up and down the country are overfull and hard to access. PLUS, if you haven't already, head on over to the allergy board there is masses of help over there.

My mantra has been I am my child's voice he cannot speak for himself so I must do everything I can to make his voice heard. I have needed to remind myself of this a lot to get things done.

Sorry it's so long but hopefully there is something here that may be helpful going forward.