Dry hands with splits - any advice?

[jamiesam]

Hallo.

I've suffered intermittently with this for several years now. Only advice / treatment from pharmacy is 'regular use of handcream' or fucibet cream from doctor when splits on knuckles become infected (ugh).

Anyone else discovered a great cream that lasts without being too greasy, is antiseptic, anaesthetic/painkilling and works quickly. Thing is, my hands can look passable one day, and then have half a dozen splits on finger ends and knuckles the next day, which will then take up to a week to heal.

I just know that someone out there know the answer...

Message withdrawn

I recently went to gp about mine too and he prescribed me pretty strong hydrocortisone. Didn't get it as I had some Dermovate in the house and checked with the pharmasist that this would do the same job. Used it am and pm for about three days and it went - just like that - it was driving me up the wall for several weeks, just not healing. I'm also using plain old aqueous cream during the day (no hc now), as often as I pass the jar and it seems to be under control. Obviously I wouldn't want to use strong hc for long periods, but it has certainly given my split skin a short, sharp shift. The gp took it seriously and I felt a bit embarrassed about going to see him about it tbh, but at the end of the day, I couldn't use my dominant hand properly and it was affecting just about everything I did.
Might invest in some diprobase too next time I'm in Boots.

wonder why we all get split hands so much? are we doing to much in the house ..

Okay, don't laugh, this is a true thing - Crack Cream. I see it in Wal-Mart all the time and it is supposed to work well. Do you have it in the UK?

Must rave about diprobase (the BEST so far for overnight, with pair of cotton gloves) and Holland and Barratt Tea Tree Oil Skin Wash - it smells divine and leaves my hands so soft (sorry about advertising guff!) that I'm really inclined to believe about Sodium Laureth Sulphate being a baddie (as this has Ammonium Lauryl Sulphate instead). Also on special offer at the moment so not too expensive (for soap).

And the awards go to : Maisystar, Polgara2, Carla, Gingerbear and Albosmum for Diprobase. Fran1, Ionesmum, Gingerbear (again!) for advice on hand wash.

Obviously if any of these start to fail me, I'll be considering some of the other lovely suggestions, including udder cream(!), crack cream (!!! do hope it's NOT available here) and the other cream with extract of urine (where's the emoticon for uuuugggghhhh)

In the meantime, with lovely soft hands, thanks ever so much.