Fungal rash - no sign of getting better. Any suggestions?

[JonSnowedUnder]

My 5 year old has a rash on his cheek which has been there for about 9 months now. He's been seen by a couple of doctors and a nurse (only 1 doc and nurse f2f) who agree it's fungal and have prescribed a variety of steroid and anti-fungal creams, none of which have made any difference at all, if fact one of them of them made it worse. Last time we checked in with the nurse she said she was positive it was fungal but they've basically run out of different creams to try and to leave it alone for a bit.

Am I being fobbed off? Should he be referred to dermatology? It's not dry or itchy and it doesn't bother him but it's quite noticeable.

Do you think your son might be allergic to steroid creams, that's why rash has not improved? My granddaughter is, she has eczema on the backs of her knees, steroid cream was prescribed and the eczema became worse, she was scratching worse than ever. She just has emolients as treatment now, but I don't think they would work on a fungal rash. I'm sure a medically trained person will advise on this thread.

Don’t know if this is helpful or not but my Dd had recurrent (every 6 months or so) fungal infections with associated eczema when she was younger. After using topical creams (gp prescribed) on and off for about a year, I found a solution: Washing the area once daily with dilute hibiscrub and using metonium cream twice a day; redness disappeared overnight and skin back to normal within three days. Since then (two years) she’s only had one flare up. Treated immediately with same hibiscrub/metanium cream and it’s gone after two days.
I used the metanium cream for ten days total each time, even when the skin looked clear again.
Best of luck.

Thanks for the response @Carreterra, I don't think he is allergic to the steroid creams as he has tried about 5 and of those 4 gave him no reaction for better or worse, just one seemed to aggravate it (not much).

@HairyFeline I will definitely give that a go - thanks! Fingers crossed.

Have they taken a swab?

Have they ruled out Strep A?

Very interesting to read your post, we had a very similar situation with my 5 year old (persistent rash on cheek for months! Not dry or itchy but very, very red). After paying to see a private dermatologist, it was thought to be psoriasis due to family history. Could this be a possibility? By the time of our appointment, it had improved quite a lot but we were prescribed a stronger steroid. We were surprised they were considering psoriasis as it didn’t look as we’d expect it to.

@randommess no swab just looking at it. That's why I feel fobbed off, they've decided it's fungal (May well be) but no typical fungal treatments are working so they just want to leave it.

@thebearandthemare I hadn't thought of psoriasis as it doesn't look like the pictures I've seen but maybe it's something to consider.