Eczema

[Kmitchz]

Hi all, I'm new here and at my wits end, hoping someone can help.

I have a three year old daughter who suffers badly from eczema, especially at night. The back of her neck and arms, she claws at in bed, and we are woken 8-9 times a night from her crying from making herself bleed by scratching to apply cream and mop up blood.

We have the following creams, eumovate and betnovate steroid and then diprobase and Epiderm, nothing is working!

The health visitor gave us a garment to put under her night clothes to try and stop her scratching but she just pulled the sleeves up to scratch, and then developed heat rash as she was too hot in it. She's also said she thinks it's habit and we have to try and break the scratching habit, but how! We've tried coverig her hands but it doesn't work

I really don't know what to do, she's in so much pain and we've only just been referred so have up to 8 months on the waiting list

X

I'd definitely see the Gp, she might need antibiotics if it's gotten infected from the scratching and they can give you a stronger steroid cream for while it's this bad. The piriton at night does help, they'll give you the nighttime drowsy one which knocks them out and can sometimes send them deep enough to not scratch.

What washing detergent are you using? Anything other than fairy liquid or ecover sends dd's skin wild. We also only bath her twice a week to prevent drying her skin which seems to work.

Poor DD.

Right.

Insist on a referral to paediatric allergy clinic. They will do skin prick tests to eliminate any food allergens. After wheat/dairy, egg is a very common allergy. Try an elimination for a week.

Meanwhile:

Surcare not detergent.

Are you applying creams correctly?

Apply an emollient thick enough to write your name in, smooth it on in direction of hair growth, do not rub. I recommend hydromol ointment, which is like Vaseline in consistency. When it has fully sunken in, can take 15 mins or more, then put on a steroid. Ointments are better than creams as they stick better. Steroids are not as bad for the skin as long term eczema, so do not be stingy.
When using creams, never put your fingers in the pot, always use a clean implement to get out cream, to avoid contamination. GPs can be nervous about steroids. Consultant gave us 2.5% hydrocortisone ointment for face, 0.5 Elocon for body.

Apply emollients several times a day.

In addition
Natural fibres
Drink lots of water
Keep nails very short
Piriton to reduce scratching

Aveeno is great when skin is a bit dry.

Ditch the HV! I had horrible eczema as a little girl, your poor DD, I know how it feels. Of course scratching is a habit but it's still a reaction to itchy skin, bloody silly comment. I still get massive flare ups when I'm stressed, and scratch myself to bit, the stress/tiredness/frustration whatever makes ignoring the itching much much harder, so it's a vicious circle, but if my skin didn't itch in the first place I wouldn't scratch at all!! Go to GP and ask for urgent referral. I was little in the 70s and I had Valagon to help me sleep which I assume was basically Valium!!! Bet you won't get that now, but Piriton sounds a great idea. Water filter transformed my skin if you want something else to try. Much sympathy, OP.

Hi All,

Sorry to hear about your little one. My cousins child also suffered from the same thing - She used a herbal cream which was from India and baby's skin started to clear up very quickly! but it not available here unfortunately. I have seen similar items available online. May be worth having a look in to natural herbal creams. Doctors always subscribe steroid treatment but they can do more harm to skin and leave it quite weak. I personally suffered with bad eczema and no steroid creams ever worked.

Hope this helps xx

Where do you I've OP? If you're in London I can recommend Drs if you do decide to go private.

Thank you all. I live in a tiny village in Pembrokeshire Wales, I've just spoken to my MIL and they've offered to pay for an initial private consultation, which apparently should then bump us up the nhs referral process? Is that right?

I only use non bio fairy, but will look into other ones online to try.

I'm going to write a list of things to request from the doctor and I will add to that about the allergy testing!

Sounds like we are applying the cream correct, but she now hates having cream applied as its open wounds so putting anything on her is a mission.

I spoke to the pharmacist today and asked and piriton and they said it wouldn't stop the itching and I would need a cream to apply that stops itching, but I'm unsure as to whether that's actually correct.

I probably sound ridiculous, but the lack of sleep, work and her being in pain is just all getting a lot. Plus when we take her out people don't say ' oh what a gorgeous little girl' they say ' oh god what's wrong with her skin'

'Itch relief' cream does nothing for eczema in my experience.

From a recommendation on here We tried Lush dream cream, which worked well on very dry skin. I wouldn't use it on broken skin though.

Hydromol can be got with or without prescription.

Another advantage of piriton is that if your dd is having an allergic response to something she is eating, which is causing the eczema, it should tone the reaction down

If she hates the cream because of stinging ask the Gp for the ointment types as it doesn't seem to cause them the stinging sensation. Tbh, when my dd crys at the cream stinging it's usually because her exzema is infected and she needs antibiotics or antibiotic ointment. The first time my dd's exzema got infected I couldn't tell by looking at it, I didn't think it looked too bad, it's not always easily noticeable. I felt terrible when the Gp said it was as i hadn't thought it was that bad. The ointment and antibiotics cleared it up quite quickly though and after about 2 weeks of steroid it was back to its usual dry condition.

I don't think it hurts her as when we do manage to put it on she says it feels better, I think she thinks it will hurt so that's why she's kicking off before we apply it.

HV said it didn't look infected but I will get the doctor to have a look at it also just to make sure

Hi all,

Quick update, we went to the doctors yesterday, they said they would refer us privately but we need a letter from the health visitor and she'll be able to recommend private places locally.

Got given some piriton type stuff which worked last night. Said they wouldn't refer for allergy test as there are so many things it could be and unless we have a specific thing we want tested, it was hard to test for them all.

Since switching back to steroid + aveno cream her skin has cleared up massively which is good, and she hasn't scratched for two nights. We've also turned the hall light off at night to see if that was playing a part in her waking and it seems to have helped

That's great news. Once it looks like her skin has cleared up it's still under the surface so you still need to keep using the steroid cream for another week as if you stop too soon it just comes back.

We've got to use the steroid 5 days on, two off until further notice. Hope we are finally out of this flare up! Fingers crossed

Great, glad you're getting some help! Best of luck.

Keep trying all the different moisturizers available from the GP, one of them might work, I felt like we tried everything before we found one that worked. Also they come in different weights. You might find ointment works better than lotion or vice versa. We now use Epaderm, the heaviest weight (which I think feels disgusting - like rubbing on butter). But DD likes it and it mostly works.
The GP should be happy to give you a trial prescription of the smallest size of everything for your to try. And chase for the referral as you say. You'll have impetigo or worse if it stays like that photo.
Good luck.

Hi all, had a private consultation today and we've been prescribed he following

Flucloxacillin- 4x a day for 7 days
Dermol 600 in the bath
Dermol 500 as a bath wash
Betnovate C cream for 14 days
Elocon cream for 7 days
Audovate for 5 days
Oilatum shampoo
Ucerax syrup 1 hour before bed

Excellent, I hope you see an improvement soon OP