Posted by
mummybee1
18 yrs ago
Some of you would know that I have a child with severe allergies. Recently she had her second skin prick test (the first being 16/16 negative results) and we found she is allergic to eggs, gluten in all forms, dairy, pork, beef, apple, peach, cauliflower, broccoli to name a few and given the redness of the prick site for peanuts she is likely developing a strong allergy to peanuts (which doesn't manifest till a child reaches 3). It is disheartening whenever she breaks out in rashes/hives, which used to be very often as we "knew no better". After much trial-and-error, we found several things that we do control her eczema well, and today her eczema is very much controlled and some people don;t even believe that her skin used to be flaky and thick and rough and sometimes bleeding! so I would like to shre my "tips" and perhaps they may be useful to other parents with eczema kids:
(1) be fastidous about people touching baby's skin especially after they have eaten. My daughter reacts to eggs even non-orally, ie., if someone ate eggs and this person kisses or touches her, she will have a localised skin rash. An allergic reaction can happen via a non-oral route. I brush my teeth after every meal before touching her.
(2) beware of the mosturiser you use. My daughter reacts to uroderm, cepthahil and Jurlique. She can only use Mustela Stellatopia.
(3) This tip is taught to me by Katetam. Kate, remember how you "ionise" the water before bathing your bub? Well, I suspect one thing your ionising does is "clean" the water 'cos eversince I bought a special showerhead to bath my bub in the resutlant filter water, her skin has improved dramatically. Either HK water is not very clean or my dauther's sensitive skin can't take certain chemicals in the water. Whatever it is, I found bathing her in filtered water helps heaps.
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mummybee1, good to hear you have found SOME way and somet THING that helps your child's eczema. It's so frustrating, and difficult to combat this problem... it's not life threatening, but it's definitely stressful, and personally, as a young child, I have had to battle it myself throughout my life.... and STILL is. I think the water quality in HK is of course non-comparable to the quality we have in Canada, and mummybee, you are right, it's something definitely in the environment. b/c since I moved back to HK, my skin has been acting up again... never for the last 20 years I grew up in Canada.... since moving back to HK, in the last 2 years, my skin is starting to have weird rashes, itchiness..etc.
Fortunately, my babies are still doing well... I know my older daughter reacts to eggs. Everytime she eats eggs, she will scratch like crazy. She can only have egg yolks. Which, is exactly like my case when I was younger.
Good luck to you, and your child, I hope she will get better as she grows older.
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mummybee1, just thought you might also want to know, recently I have been having problems with my own eczema, (stress, dry weather)... so I tried this brand of skin care line for babies with problem skin and eczema... called Bioderma. It's been AWESOME. I put it on my face at night like an overnight cream, even with the heater on the whole night, next morning, my face is still moist, but not oily. I love it, I use it now all over my body after bath, it's been great for my eczema. Much better now. I also use the Pinetarsol for shower.
My babies are using the baby shower gel from this brand, and then they are using the cream with PP in it. The information is, after 28 days using the cream with PP, their skin gets a full regrowth/replenish cycle... something like that. Thus far, my daughter's skin and even the scars have dramatically improved.
Thought you might want to look into it.
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Hi ladies -
this may sound weird, but have either of you tried giving your baby seaweed for the eczema? my daughter mild (not severe like both of yours) eczema as a baby, and once I started regularly giving her seaweed mixed in with her meals, the eczema disappeared. My older one is still prone to it at times, but whenever she eats seaweed soup and seaweed in her food, it is much better.
This is only anecdotal evidence, but I did read somewhere that seaweed expels toxins from the body. Something from the seaweed leeches onto toxins and causes them to pass out.
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May I ask where can I find Bioderma products. One of my sons also has a bit of eczema and I've been using Mustela's Stellatopia and the results aren't great on him, it helped but definitely not as much as I hope it would.
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jele
18 yrs ago
Hello,
My child had eczema since she was a baby.
I have tried several things, go to several doctors, used many many cream ....
We have tried a chinese doctor (chinese medicine) and in 4 days her skin was perfect.
He has discover she also has some allergies. But each time some eczema appears, we have a special cream.
It works really and it's really cheaper than our medicine.
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Kate, would love to know where you get this Bioderma from. All your suggestions have been invaluable and I can't wait to try this cream on my daughter. BTW what is "cream with PP"??? It is so weird that my daughter is going through exactly the same thing as you. I brought her back to Australia for holidays/checkup with her paed allergist coupla months back and despite the harsh dry cold winter, her skin was perfect - the rash circling her mouth, which was perpetually there in HK - DISAPPEARED for the 6 weeks we were there, and her neck discolouration cleared to beautiful flawless skin. But within days after we came back to HK, her mouth rash flares up again. It is definitely something in HK that causes the rashes, pollution, water, who knows...
Jele, I may be being overcautious here but I have heard that some chinese doctors prescribed "wonder" medications that do clear eczema within days but it turns out that many of these medications have plant-based steriods in them, in dosages much much higher than that in western steriod creams like hydrocortisone/elomet/flucinolone. Please be careful using creams where the ingredient list was not clearly listed.
HKchoichoi, do you have a recipe of seaweed soup? Another dumb question: where can I get real good (ie chemical-free?) seaweed from? Given my daughter's multiple allergies, I need to make sure of every little ingredient that I am putting into her mouth!
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I can only speak from a Korean seaweed perspective. There is "farmed" or some that come from seaweed "farms" and there is deep sea seaweed. The deep sea stuff is supposedly better, but personally I find it a bit "scary" as the seaweed looks a bit like scary monsters when it is rehydrated. you cut it up and then make it into a soup with your desired broth. i don't remember everything your daughter is allergic to, but you could try chicken stock? It is simply a matter of rehydrating the seaweed (soaking it in fresh clean water for 30 minutes) and then draining it. Cut it up into manageable pieces. Sautee it in sesame oil (if your daughter isn't allergic or another oil that your daughter can take) and then pouring broth over it. it's very nice with rice.
Otherwise, I just boil mine in water, and then puree it and freeze it into ice cubes like the rest of the baby food. Then I usually dump a cube in with at least one meal a day.
I have seen two kids in Seoul with eczema, but that it is it, in contrast to the number of babies and children I saw with eczema in HK. It must be something in the water, or pollution, but I'm not sure as Seoul isn't exactly pristine clean city either.
Japanese have several types of seaweed - wakame, konbu, but i'm not sure of the processing of them. But these are readily in HK, and perhaps you could try one of them. I do remember wakame being very "simple" meaning, that the leaves are very light and not tied to the heavier vine structure that Korean seaweed is. I dont' know if that means that there is less health benefit or what, as I've not used it.
I remember Citysuper having Korean seaweed - green and yellow package I think - and it was a well known brand. It's been a while, so I can't be sure, but if you're serious about trying it, you can try some of the Korean shops are Kimberly road in TST. The Korean word is "meeyuk"
Good luck!
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My mom's friend gave us this tip: NEEM. I now have a bag full of neem leaves and neem oil. I've been bathing my baby in neem tea (neem leaves boiled in water) and massaging him twice a day with QV cream and a drop of neem oil. During the day I dab him with cottonwool dipped in neem tea and then rub QV over it everytime I change his diaper. The results are nothing short of miraculous. I can actually see the flareup lessen before my eyes, and he is significantly less itchy.
He's is now on Proud Parents immersed in a neem bath happily chewing on his rubber duck...
If you do an internet search you'll find dozens of sites on neem as a treatment for eczema and other skin conditions.
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mummybee1, I got my creams and a set for the kids at Bebe Dream. However, I went into Mannings today, and they are selling this brand as well. A little more expensive though. However, they are out of stock already for it, but maybe other Mannings will have it too. ( I was at the APM one).
Hkchoichoi, thanks for the tip. I LOVE seaweed, especially "kim" ? (Is that how you spell it?) I had LOTS of korean friends in school, their moms would homemake them for us... took boxes of them home to eat and wrap rice in it. Maybe that's when my skin improved and didn't know it was the seaweed.
My daughter loves seaweed too, unfornately, the tasty one... (MSG) Japanese one. I will try to mix in some as you suggest.
What's the brand name of seaweed you recommend from Citysuper? (yellow packing?) Do you have a name?
Thanks.
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Katetam -
no problem on the seaweed. Yes- kim (ggim) is the dried seaweed. (laver.) there are Korean versions that do not have MSG - just sesame oil and salt. They have a few versions at city super - and if I remember correctly have the ingredients listed out in English.
The brand, (i went and looked it up at the supermarket) is dark green with lighter green and a red sort of badge. It is called Ottogi brand, but I'm not sure it's availabe then. There is also CJ brand which is good and Chung jung won. Tell me what you find at City super and I can tell you if it's a well known brand.
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wow, I am gonna be busy next few weeks trying on all these new "solutions"! yeah, where can we get this neem leaves from?
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Hiya Mummybee. I got the neem leaves from people who were coming over from India, but the neem oil you can get from the Indian Provision Stores in causeeway bay. Just got three bottles from there for 18bucks each. Its so effective its unbelievable!
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Its in a little alley on Bowrington road, I think. I'm hopeless at addresses, but the number is 2891-8324, call and they'll give you the address.
The protocol I follow is to sponge baby down with cottonwool dipped in either warm water or neem water (thus replacing moisture on his skin) and then quickly seal it in with a mixture of QV and neem oil. I don't like applying cream on already dry skin.
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bbvv
18 yrs ago
I have been told that Aqueous Cream BP available from Manning is pretty good for treating eczema as well as severe skin dryness and it is safe on babies too. I have been using this for myself as during the winter months I itch like crazy and sometime bleed from it. You can use it as a cleanser and then rinse off. I normally top it up with the cream as a moisturiser and my itch has stopped considerably.
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Mints and Mummybee - this is a quick note: do NOT buy the neem from the indian shop. The one they have is from the neem flower. We need the oil from the neem SEED, which is what I had originally.
For the past week I've been using the oil bought from the Indian shop (which has a flower on it) and baby has broken out. I asked my naturopath doctor and she said that chances are if its from the flower it likely has traces of pollen it it to which he might be reacting.
I therefore have purchased a gallon of neem SEED oil from the internet, used it yesterday, and VOILA, rash 75% gone this morning!
Let me know if you'd like to try some of the oil/leaves etc, I'll give you some for a tiny fee!
Cheers
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Atopalm MLE is a non-steriod cream which is beneficial for rosacea, sensitive skin, dry skin and eczema. It restores the skin's own barrier function allowing it to repair itself.
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I just want to share that I took the advise of one of the moms (sorry, can't remember who since this thread is rather long) and tried the 'Bioderma' cream and shower gel and after two days of using them, my son's skin showed significant improvement. Will keep using it for the winter months. Thank you so much.
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Sky
18 yrs ago
Hi, I went to Mannings and found that Bioderma actually have many different lines. Could you tell me which line/cream/lotion you are recommending. Its not cheap so don't want to get the wrong one. Thanks!
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Just want to all of you know that "Aveeno" works really well on my daughter who also suffers from eczema. For the first time in all her life :) I don't have to use any kind of medicated cream on her.
Tried Mustela Stellatopia as well, but didn't see any improvement at all :(
If only we know where to get Aveeno in HK as we got ours from the US when we went there recently.
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Sky, the cream I got is the 'Atoderm' range. There is an introductory pack which costs $338 which consists of a full size cream and shower gel plus two travel size cream. It's cheaper than just buying the cream itself which already costs like $260 if I remembered correctly.
Micchira, you can get Aveeno products at the health 'store' in City Super in Times Square. Not the supermarket side but the lifestyle products section. They even have 'Aveeno Baby' range if that's the cream you use on your daughter.
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Glad to hear other Moms found the Atoderm from Bioderma helpful !!! I have to stock up lots now......
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Sam01
16 yrs ago
My son also had severe eczema, one pediatrician called it one of the top 10% worst cases in Hong Kong. Here is the BEST resource for eczema that I have come across. I wish I had found it three years ago when I was really struggling with it.
http://www.eczema.net/default.html
Good luck !
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any body using this line to control eczema???http://www.discoverb4a.com/Eczema_c_596.html
i want to order but they can't deliever to hk....so sad
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ozdb
14 yrs ago
Hi, My daughter had moderate exema for 3 years. We tried many products, tried many diet changes. Finally we saw results when we put a water filter on the bath tap and started using Exederm products. She has had only 2-3 MILD flare ups in the last year. The Exederm products have not damaged her skin like some of the steroid creams prescribed by doctors here in Hong Kong. Her skin looks normal and healthy.
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misza
14 yrs ago
Dear ozdb,
may I know more about the water filter and where to buy it? Whats exederm products?
Thanks a lot,
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The Allergy Shop
www.theallergyshop.com.au
The Allergy Shop is the leading on-line store specialized in eczema products.
In the on-line store you will find garments and bandages for wet and dry wrappings, eczema clothing, creams and emollients as well as bedding, home and personal care products.
Quick shipping: goods are dispatched on the same day or the day after with the option of express mail.
The Allergy Shop sells on-line in Australia and Worldwide.
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