Books about Excema

[jadekat]

Just wondering what books are the best. Both my children have excema. I'm trying to figure out the cause and not just cover it up with creams.

[karin95]

I don't have any specific book recs for you, but I'll tell you a little bit of what I've learned about eczema. My son had it severely from 2 months old (weeping, infected, all over his face and much of his body). We found out that food allergies (and environmental allergies) are often a major contributor to eczema. We had his blood tested (CAP-RAST test) through a pediatric allergist when he was 7 months old, and found out he has many food allergies, plus cat & dog allergies. He was exclusively bf, so eliminating those foods from all our diets, and moving our cats to my MILs, reduced his eczema greatly.

We also had to start topical hydrocortisone cream (after trying holistic salves and homeopathy and stuff) because he was too miserable and spent all day scratching. it was stunting him developmentally. That cleared him up almost immediately.

We also did "wet wrapping" on his body, which is basically this:
give child 20-minute warm bath
within 3 minutes of getting out of the bath, lotion him up with Vanicream or other lotion.
WET not-loose cotton turtleneck & stretch pants (100% cotton) in water and put them on the child (yes, really!)
Then put fleece pjs or other fleece clothes on over, to keep the wet clothes from leaking everywhere, and to keep the child warm.
Put them down for a nap, or to sleep for the night.
Keep the wet clothes on for a minimum of 2 hours. Longer is not necessarily better.

We did this twice/day (2 baths!) for about a month or so, and since then, our son's body has been eczema-free. No steroid on his arms/legs/torso. Just Vanicream twice/day. Now we're trying to figure out a way to wetwrap his head/face, because he still has some eczema there, and we want to get away from using steroid completely.

We've also tried Emily's Skin Soother and that seems to work pretty well. We've used it on a small outbreak on his groin and behind his ears, after a cat exposure. We're also going to try to transition to using just that on his face and see what happens.

The theory of the wetwrapping comes from National Jewish MEdical and Research Center in CO. They're the top place for allergies/eczema. They say that eczema happens in skin that doesn't know how to hold moisture. It's like a defect in the skin. Wet wrapping can, often, teach the skin how to hold moisture in. If the skin doesn't "learn", then you have to help it stay moist - with frequent long baths, good lotions, etc.

[karin95]

Oh, and we still give him a 15-20 minute bath every day. And goop him up with Vanicream twice/day and Vanicream lotion whenever he seems dry.

And we're still seeing a homeopath to address his allergies/eczema/pre-asthma, etc. That's also helping a lot, too.

[karin95]

Sorry for the triple post!
Just thought this link would be helpful to you:
http://www.nationaljewish.org/disease-info/diseases/allergy/about/conditions/eczema.aspx

[jadekat]

Thanks for the great information karin95!