Friday, July 24, 2009

Cure For Eczema

By John James

Eczema is a disease in a form of dermatitis, or inflammation of the epidermis. Eczemas originating from ingestion of medications, foods, and chemicals, have not yet been clearly systematized. Eczema can be exacerbated by dryness of the skin.

Anti-itch drugs, often antihistamine, may reduce the itch during a flare up of eczema, and the reduced scratching in turn reduces damage and irritation to the skin (the Itch cycle). Moisturizing is one of the most important self-care treatments for sufferers of eczema.

Eczema is a term for different types of skin inflammation . Eczema is a general term for many types of skin inflammation, also known as dermatitis. Eczema can affect people of any age, although the condition is most common in infants.

Eczema will permanently resolve by age 3 in about half of affected infants. Eczema most commonly causes dry, reddened skin that itches or burns, although the appearance of eczema varies from person to person and varies according to the specific type of eczema.

One of the recommendations is that people suffering from eczema should not use detergents of any kind on their skin unless absolutely necessary. Eczema sufferers can reduce itching by using cleansers only when water is not sufficient to remove dirt from skin.

A review of epidemiological data in the UK has also found an inexorable rise in the prevalence of eczema over time. Further recent increases in the incidence and lifetime prevalence of eczema in England have also been reported, such that an estimated 5,773,700 or about one in every nine people have been diagnosed with the disease by a clinician at some point in their lives.

Although most eczema recommendations use the terms "detergents" and "soaps" interchangeably, and tell eczema sufferers to avoid both, detergents and soaps are not the same and are not equally problematic to eczema sufferers.

Unfortunately there is no one agreed-upon best kind of skin cleanser for eczema sufferers. While it has been suggested that eczema may sometimes be an allergic reaction to the excrement from house dust mites, with up to 5% of people showing antibodies to the mites, the overall role this plays awaits further corroboration.

However it is not clear whether such measures actually help patients with eczema. In a 2009 study from Northwestern University, children with moderate or severe eczema were giving diluted bleach baths and this reduced the severity of the disease.

Light therapy (or Deep penetrating light therapy) using ultraviolet light can help control eczema. Dietary elements that have been reported to trigger eczema include dairy products and coffee (both caffeinated and decaffeinated), soybean products, eggs, nuts, wheat and maize (sweet corn), though food allergies may vary from person to person.

Eczema is not easy to diagnose since it shows similarities with other skin conditions. Eczema sufferers are often embarrassed to scratch their skin in public, so they do it in privacy. People are often worried that the medications that they are taking to treat their eczema have side effects. Eczema treatments and medications are both expensive and frustrating because most of them simply do not work.

According to the British Association of Dermatologists, there is considerable anecdotal evidence that salt water baths may help some children with atopic eczema.

The Dead sea is popular for alleviating skin problems including eczema. Sulfur has been used for many years as a topical treatment in the alleviation of eczema, although this could be suppressive.

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