Losing battle against nappy rash

[Beoley2011]

My 16 months old DS has been suffering with nappy rash for 4 weeks now. I tried so many different things and I am running out of ideas. I tried: Timodine (prescribed by GP), Sudocrem, Bepanthen, Metanium ointment, Metanium daily ointment, Kamillosan, Camomile tea for bath, Camomile tea with cottonwool instead of wipes, nappy off times, but nothing works long enough. I even started to cut out different types of fruits from his diet, but don't seem make any difference.

I am racing against time to get his bum better every weekend, but it gets worst first day back in the nursery. Last weekend we used Timodine. On Monday his bum looked fine, a day later, when I brought him home from the nursery I was mortified that his nappy rash returned.

Could anybody give me any advice on what else I should try, that works fast enough, so he could heal withing 4 days? He does anything between 4 to 8 poos a day so some creams just don't have enough time to act.

I've been thinking of using Aloevera plant instead of cream, has anybody tried it yet?

NOthing to add really except to say that we're in the same situation and have been for, quite literally, months. I feel utterly awful about it. DS, 2.4 tells me every single nappy change that he has a saw bottom. One thing to add to your list that we have tried (with limited success) is Daktacort (prescription). I've found that handfuls of sudocrem is the most effective thing but it comes back very quickly in our case.

Interestingly we also have quite a lot of poos....

Are you aware of any food allergies with your DS? I think there might be a link in our case (DS has allergies and bad eczema). I have found that certain foods trigger his nappy rash. Particularly citrus. In fact, come to think about it, he's been eating a lot of apples recently, maybe they're triggering it.......

Anyway, interested to see what responses you get as my poor DS has had it constantly since before xmas. Only answer for us is probably potty training but he is just not ready yet.

*Sore bottom. Not saw bottom

It might be thrush, you'll need canestan for that.

At 16 months he shouldn't be doing that many poos a day. What colour, consistancy are they? Have you taken him to the docs? Does he have any allergies that you know of? Has he Eczema/Asthma? Are they changing him as regularly as possible in nursery? Is it a new nursery, what are they feeding him?

You need to look for the cause and eliminate that rather then the presenting sypmptoms. Did he start any particular new foods 4 weeks ago? How is his mouth, does his tongue have a whilte coating? Did he have a course of antibiotics in the last 6 weeks? Is he teething badly at the moment?

Is it any angry rash with pustules and pimples?

Sorry about all the questions, but to get rid of it you really need to get to the root cause.

Thanks for all the quick replies. I have been trying to find the cause with little success. I haven't given him any citrus for a long time. Although he loves fruit, I've been limiting fruit intake at the moment to banana, strawberry compote in porridge, small amount of dried fruit.
His poo is most of the time solid, but sometimes he does a couple loose too, with undigested food. The colour is light to dark brown.
He was lactose intolarent after a virus, but he is better now.

He had sickness and diarrhoea about 5 weeks ago. He started to eat twice as much as usual afterwards, then the nappy rash started.

I don't think he is teething.

My DD poos a fair bit. We use medela nappy cream which is great. I also got one the other day that's great too with hemp oil in it, but it's in DD's room and don't want to disturb her to see what it is! I also recommend putting Balneum in his bath, lots of nappy free time and have seen positive reports of painting bottoms with egg white as this is a total barrier against poo and wee. Let it dry before nappy goes on. What nappies do you use? If disposable, it could be the chemicals in them. how horrible for you and him. I hope you find a resolution and I will let you know the name of the other stuff in the morning .

Thanks for the advice HuggyPomBear. Where did you get the cream, and what Balneum is? I've never heard about it before. We use pampers from the beginning, so I doubt if that the problem.

Try Vaseline, and lather it on. My two didn't get nappy rash that bad but I did use this which I found just worked as a barrier to stop the rash becoming more irritated, and allow it to heal itself from the inside out IYSWIM? Always worth a try anyway.
I don't suppose you're still breastfeeding? Breastmilk works wonders too but at 16mo I'm a bit hopeful!
Your poor little one. 4-8 poos a day does sound a lot, almondfinger has a fair good few points.

I always use elizabeth arden eight hour cream when it is really bad and it generally clears up overnight. Is expensive but you only need a bit, and it does stay put.

I got medela from waitrose but have also seen it in my local health food store. Balneum is a soya oil bath oil available in the chemists. Use more than it recommends for babies as it takes into account babies are in a small bath whereas if you use a normal bath with more water you need more of the oil. I found my DD was allergic to metanium.

Hello,

DS often has a very sore bottom and thething that really works for him and also worked for our DD is Drapolene. It can also be used for burns and I used to just put a really thick layer on, and it really did work wonders on them.

I hope you find something that works soon.

Take care

nystsan cream!

I'd also cut out all other acidic foods, tomatoes, pineapples, tart apples, grapes and raisins for now and once he is better reintroduce and see how it goes. How do you know he is no longer lactose intolerant?

I hope he is better soon.

My initial thought is that he is not having his nappy changed frequently enough at nursery. If you can get it under control at weekends only for it to be back by Monday eve then talk to your nursery in strong terms.

Can you take a couple of days off work? If you can get the rash better over the w/e & keep it better for mon & tues then you see rash back after nursery on Weds you'll know it isn't the cream but the care.

My son had horrific eczema as a baby, and when he got nappy rash we had to get it cleared up as quickly as possible. I found weleda nappy cream was the best (and we tried a lot of different types) - it's more expensive that sudocrem etc, but really good. It contains camomile. (It's actually on offer on ocado this week)

Ooh, that's a good point Destination.

Both my kids seemed to get sore bottoms really quickly if we leave them for any length of time if we hadn't noticed for example. Esp if their poop is very acidic.

Also sounds to me like nursery isn't changing her nappy quickly enough. If you can fix it at the weekend, then it's fixable. Unless you're not allowing the nursery to have whatever cream you're using :-S
go speak to her keyworker.

I think they do change him fairly quick, when they notice it. But I'm not sure it is as fast as I would change him. And they can't give him nappy off time at the nursery. They have all the creams I'm using, the except camomile tea for the cottonwool.

We tried Kamilosan, which seems like vaseline with camomile, but it made it worse.

I'm not sure what I can do to stop him doing so many poos. I think he has a very fast metabolism. I think I used to be like that.

I'll try to reduce tomatoes, but its getting difficult to give him a balanced diet. So many healthy food is acidic.

Almondfinger
I tried to give him normal milk again and it doesn't cause him diarrhoea. So I think he should be ok. He only has 4-5 oz milk a day + porridge, yoghurt, cheese.

The other stuff is called organic babies soothing baby salve.

I would cut out bananas and strawberries, they gave my DD awful nr.

If it's a problem linked to nursery (which it sounds like it is), have you checked what gloves they use (assuming they do) when changing him? I have exactly the same issue with my 16mo DS at the moment (he also poos at least 4 times per day whilst at nursery, 5-6 times per day in total). Never has nappy rash at home, always gets it the first day back at nursery (goes 3 days per week).

I have to raise it every day at nursery as am convinced it's something they are doing differently which causes it. It isn't a food issue, isn't a nappy issue, isn't a wipes issue, because it's never a problem at home. The gloves are something we are investigating atm.

Btw, I totally disagree with almondfinger about it not being normal to do that many poos a day. Every baby is different and some poo a lot. Mine has a fast metabolism and has always been a poo monster, no medical issues or food allergies and poo always looks normal.

thanks for all the replies. I managed to get a day off from work, so we have an extra day to get DS's bum better. I asked the local pharmacist about all the cream people suggested and she suggested canestan. It's seem to be working.
Thanks

When my DD suffered with this a childrens nurse told me to mix up Metanium, Sudocreme and Vaseline together in a pot and apply, its what they use on the ward and works a treat!.

Thanks for the advice ChiefPotterer, sometimes I put one cream on the top of another, but never thought to mix them up.
Thanks